Peter Thiel: We’re in a Higher Education Bubble
What Thiel doesn't get is that the reason why it's a bubble is also what keeps it afloat.  It's exclusionary, and something inherent in humans is a desire to categorize and compartmentalize -- credentials.<p>Sure, if you're starting a web startup or a basketball team, no one cares where you went to school (although an offensive lineman in football benefits from going to a top tier school -- despite football being a meritocracy its surprisingly difficult to measure how effective linemen are).  But the top lawyers, doctors, professors, and even business managers will be recruited from where people think the best people are.<p>The ironic thing is that the only reason people listen to Peter Thiel is because of his credentials as PayPal co-founder and VC investor.  There are a million people have an opinion on education and tecnology.  There's too much noise -- the ideas that are listened to are those that come from people who have done soemthing in the past -- a credential.  At a massive scale college is still THE credential.<p>And surprisingly the internet has actually made elite schools more important, not less.  Pre-internet regional schools were often held in near equal esteem as Harvard/Yale.  As information became more fluid (USNWR and the internet) the ranking of credentials became easier to obtain.  This won't change.