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Visualized: The Top Feeder Schools into Silicon Valley

Visualized: The Top Feeder Schools into Silicon Valley

Silicon Valley is one of the largest and most prominent tech hubs in the world. It accounts for about one-third of America’s national investment capital and it houses the headquarters of over 30 companies in the Fortune 1000.

Given its world-class reputation, it’s the dream of many tech workers to land a job in a Silicon Valley company. But what’s the best route for getting there?

While there is certainly no clear-cut path, one way to try and answer this question is by looking at the universities and colleges that Silicon Valley employees graduate from.

This interactive map by ​Stephanie Cristea shows the top feeder schools to some of the largest companies in Silicon Valley.

A Look at The Top 30 Schools

The data for this graphic comes from a study by College Transitions, which looks at the top feeder schools for 12 different companies with employees in Silicon Valley, including Twitter, Alphabet, DocuSign, Meta, and eight other large businesses.

Using publicly available data from LinkedIn, the study looked at more than 70,000 entry level engineers and IT employees at these 12 different companies, and identified where they received their undergraduate degree.

Here are the findings of the top 30 feeder schools across all 12 companies:

Rank (Total) Institution # Employed Top Employer
1 Carnegie Mellon University 1,356 Google
2 University of Southern California 1,252 Google
3 University of California, Berkeley 1,212 Google
4 Georgia Institute of Technology 1,094 Microsoft
5 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 877 Google
6 University of Washington 876 Microsoft
7 University of California, San Diego 795 Google
8 University of Waterloo 793 Google
9 University of California, Los Angeles 704 Google
10 Stanford University 661 Google
11 Columbia University 651 Google
12 University of Michigan 632 Google
13 Cornell University 612 Google
14 Northeastern University 604 Google
15 University of Texas at Austin 578 Google
16 University of California, Irvine 482 Google
17 San Jose State University 470 Google
18 Purdue University 469 Microsoft
19 University of Toronto 466 Google
20 New York University 464 Google
21 Massachusetts Institute of Technology 405 Google
22 University of Pennsylvania 352 Google
23 University of California, Davis 333 Google
24 North Carolina State University 329 Google
25 University of Maryland 309 Google
26 Duke University 304 Google
27 Harvard University 260 Google
28 University of Wisconsin, Madison 249 Google
29 University of Virginia 244 Microsoft
30 Brown University 236 Google

While this research is far from exhaustive, it provides a glimpse of where 12 of the largest companies in Silicon Valley source their talent, and what it takes to make it into the big leagues.

Adjusted Proportional Rankings

Next, let’s look at the ranking after being adjusted proportionally for each school’s undergraduate enrolment numbers (so smaller schools can be fairly represented in the data):

Rank (Adjusted) Institution # Employed Top Employer
1 Carnegie Mellon University 1356 Google
2 Columbia University 651 Google
3 Stanford University 661 Google
4 Massachusetts Institute of Technology 405 Google
5 California Institute of Technology 78 Google
6 Harvey Mudd College 72 Google
7 Georgia Institute of Technology 1094 Microsoft
8 University of Southern California 1252 Google
9 Rice University 235 Google
10 Harvard University 260 Google
11 Duke University 304 Google
12 Cornell University 612 Google
13 Northeastern University 604 Google
14 University of California, Berkeley 1212 Google
15 University of Pennsylvania 352 Google
16 Princeton University 170 Google
17 Brown University 236 Google
18 Santa Clara University 180 Google
19 Northwestern University 226 Google
20 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign 877 Google
21 Swarthmore College 36 Google
22 University of California San Diego 795 Google
23 University of Washington 876 Microsoft
24 Yale University 115 Google
25 Washington University in St. Louis 183 Google
26 Johns Hopkins University 143 Google
27 University of Chicago 156 Google
28 University of California, Los Angeles 704 Google
29 University of Waterloo 793 Google
30 University of Michigan 632 Google

Interestingly, when looking at the adjusted figures, only two of the top 10 feeder schools are Ivy League institutions: Columbia, which comes second on the list, and Harvard, which just makes the cut at number 10.

Carnegie Mellon takes first place, with over 1,300 hired graduates across all 12 companies. While the Pittsburgh-based university is not an Ivy League school, it still has a great reputation—in a recent study by U.S. News & World Report, it ranked as one of the best universities in America.

Even with its excellent reputation, Carnegie Mellon’s acceptance rate is relatively high at 17%, especially when compared to its Ivy League counterparts like Columbia (6%) and Harvard (4%).

It’s worth mentioning that, while Ivy League didn’t dominate the top 10 list, all eight schools made it into the top 30. So, while this data shows that Silicon Valley isn’t exclusively hiring from Ivy League schools, it does indicate that these prestigious institutions have a seat at the table.

The post Visualized: The Top Feeder Schools into Silicon Valley appeared first on Visual Capitalist.

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