Grad school prestige in industry

[anonymous20]

I got rejected from most of my top choices for PhD this year and now it boils down to this: PhD in a relatively low rank UC school (top 30) or an MS in a top 10 program, which I'm hoping may lead to a PhD there. In terms of career, I'm hoping to earn my PhD and go back to industry as a sr. scientist or an engineer. Perhaps doing a post-doc in industry prior to doing that.

 

My question is, how much does school reputation play a factor when hiring in industry vs. your success in research, and would it be worth sacrificing an extra 1-2 years + $$ for a potential to lead into a better PhD program? It seems like I have a pretty good fit at the lower rank school and the professors there, but I am not sure how difficult it would be to get a job afterwards considering how competitive the PhD job market is and I would have to compete with PhDs from other Ivys.

 

Thanks for your input.

[rising_star]

Talk to the POIs at the UC school to see where their students are now working. If they're working at companies you'd consider, then you should be fine.