Your grades in university and where you are now 6

[eliou]

Hey there,

What are your thoughts on how well you did in university and where you are now? Do you think you would have a better job if you worked harder and got better grades? Anyone ever fail a course and felt that it shut doors?

 

[sms]

My experience is that grades get you your first job. After that no one looks at them again. I have worked for four companies over 24 years and the only one that asked for a transcript was the first one.

I have been very sucessful as an engineer, but I graduated with a 2.7 GPA, and I flunked and had to re take both calc 2 and calc 3 (but I really knew it after all that). I made A's and B's in all my engineering classes.

Failing those math classes and having less than a 3.0 GPA definately shut some doors. The company I work for now never would have hired me straight out of school with my transcript. The experience I gained in my first job out of school opened those doors right back up again.

-The future's so bright I gotta wear shades!
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[GregLocock]

I am fairly sure that nobody at ny of my employers has ever seen my degree certificate, and the only way they'd get my grades would be to write to the uni, I have never had a record of them.

If I had got a First (UK style scoring) then I suppose I might have been offered a couple of jobs I went for but didn't get, but I have my doubts. On the other hand I took the first year very seriously and I think that gave me a good grounding for the other two years, which were more interesting and so less mind-numbing.



Cheers

Greg Locock

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[corus]

Where I am the minimum qualification is a post-graduate qualification though nobody has asked to see proof, as far as I know. Looking back I'm fairly convinced that getting qualifications was a total waste of time and effort as I see friends and acquaintances who are effectively millionaires now with nothing more than a swimming certificate to their name. Envious? Moi?

corus

 

[SomptingGuy]

I got my first real job based on experience gained during my sponsorship (pre-university and holidays). In fact I started on the day my final grade was announced - a formality. And I got my sponsorship based on 'O' level results and predicted 'A' level results. So you could say I got my job based on exams I took when I was 15 and 16!

 

[kchayfie]

I knew I wanted to work in the water treatment business before I went to university. My degree course was focussed more towards the petrochemical / pharmaceutical / chemical industries with very little directly related to water treatment and very little that I was interested in. But I knew I needed to get the degree to get ahead so I did the absolute minimum amount of work required to be able to say I have a degree in chemical engineering and not lie about it.

My work record now speaks for itself and very soon I'll be a chartered chemical engineer (if the application for chartership goes well). I don't think better or higher qualifications would help in my chosen path but it would probably be necessary if I changed industry. The year of working pre-university has been more significant than the degree certificate.

 

[swivel63]

pretty much in line. i was horrible in high school, but i excelled in college particularly at the upper level and grad level courses in structures. mainly because they were fun to me. now i'm working pretty fast up the ladder which is a prediction an old professor of mine gave me about 6 years ago.

"when you make your first million, don't forget who helped get you there."

 

[DaveVikingPE]

I'm in the same boat as swivel63. "Gentlemen's C" in high school, went to one of them colleges that specialized in kicking the butt of high school slackers, got my act together and excelled from there one.

At this point in my career, the only regret I have is not going into finance...

 

[Lion06]

I graduated with an overall GPA of 3.85 and a technical GPA of 3.95. I have only been out of school for one year, but I honestly don't think I would have been granted an interview for my company without the good grades.
One other aspect that isn't mentioned is the confidence that high grades give you going into interviews (at least that first job out of college). When you know your GPA is higher than 95%-99% of the other fresh grads applying for the same job you are, it gives you a confidence (don't let it turn into cockiness) and that comes accross good to employers.
I think good grades get your foot in the door, but after that it is all up to you to excel.

 

[ischgl99]

My grades definitely kept me from getting interviews with the big companies (I had a lot of fun in school , but the smaller ones did not care one bit. The smaller companies were much more concerned about me being a good fit in the company then if I had top grades in school. After working for a year, I quickly realized I did not want to be stuck behind a desk doing design work, even though I enjoy doing that on occasion, and I went into the equipment field engineering and maintenance area and have had a very good career since. I advanced much quicker then I think I could have in a larger company

If I worked harder and got better grades, I probably would have gone to work for an aerospace company or maybe defense contractor and might have stayed in the design field. In hindsight, I do not have any regrets, I enjoy the field I am in now and can do design work if I want to, but most importantly, I have alot of control over my current position as well as future. Listening to a lot of the gripeing (sp?) on this and other sites, I think it is a blessing I did not get the job I expected when I entered college.

 

[TheTick]

The best grades led to the best internships.

 

[IceNine]

I had a high GPA (3.85), which helped me get my first engineering job in a pretty rough job market(Fall 2001)

Didn't really do much for me 2.5 yrs later when I got burnt out and spent a year as a bicycle messenger

 

[dcasto]

The rule of thumb, the first 3 years is grade point and school, the next 3 years is just your school, the rest of your life is what you did for your company in the last quarter......

 

[swivel63]

do people really care about university rep?

 

[KENAT]

Scraped a 2:2 having had to re-take 7 subjects in the second year. I also had to drop down from MEng to BEng as I missed the required 2nd year grade by a couple of %.

Couldn't work out why I failed even the subjects I enjoyed and thought I understood.

Turned out I had dyslexia after I got tested a few months into my final year. That said, if I'd had a less active social (or should I say drinking) life I probably could have got a 2:1 or stayed on the MEng even with the dyslexia.

I think maybe I missed one internship because of my grades (5 of us applied for 2 positions, they liked everyone except me so much that they actually gave all the others position) but I don’t think I missed any jobs. In fact I only recall one or two places asking for my grades and I got to the interview stage for them none the less.

In terms of my career it hasn’t really held me back, I don’t think anyone’s asked about my grades for a long time. In fact when my current manager found out about my fairly low grades he was surprised and has started using my as the poster child of “good grades don’t necessarily make a good engineer/employee” when interviewing interns etc.

 

[swivel63]

lol, that's true.....my mentor was on academic probation when he was in school back in the 70's in DR.

 

[dcasto]

Do people care about university? Ask a ChE from CSM vs CU, Every one from CSM had at least 3 offers and friends at CU were lucky when they got 1.

 

[civilperson]

Never heard of CU or CSM, maybe Boulder vs Golden?
Go Nebraska!

 

[KENAT]

I don't think most people care that much about which university when it comes to hiring, though I've heard of people that do.

In fact as others have said once you're a couple of years into your career no one will probably care about your grades let alone which school.

In the UK there is the stigma about traditional universities and what were 'polytechnics' but I don't know that most employers care too much.

There will always be rivalries and people will tend to think their school was better than the rival but I'd hope it isn't realy a major factor in hiring/firing. I'd be interested in anyones first hand accounts though.

(Just remembered, we have an intern program they were looking at changing and one of the justifications was that certain people wanted interns from their old school, so I guess that's a first hand example.)

 

[eliou]

Yeah I agree with people wanting interns from their old school. I know that at the University of Waterloo, every undergrad engineer is required to complete 5 co-op terms before graduation. From my experience, alot of the hiring managers are also waterloo alumni. I guess when you have lots of alumni sitting in positions of hiring, they would instinctively take waterloo students over other schools.