[Teacher Zhang talks about education]AI is reshaping the value of prestigious schools. Don’t expect to let the aura of prestigious schools determine your children’s lives!

Chinese Herald columnist Teacher Zhang (Zhang Yunteng)

The original title of this article is “Don’t let the famous school complex mislead the trajectory of your life!” Find the school that suits you! “, published in this column on May 23, 2023. In the past three years, the AI wave has had an unprecedented severe impact on the global employment situation. The current impact is only in its early stages. Worrying about it will not help. We can only respond rationally, so let’s start by examining the “prestigious school complex”!

Over the past two decades, many people have believed that “top schools” are almost equivalent to “guaranteed success.” However, by 2026, this equal sign is being completely rewritten by artificial intelligence AI.

In the AI era, is the aura of prestigious schools depreciating? Let me start with the conclusion: “The halo of prestigious schools will not disappear, but it is being repriced.” It can be summed up in one sentence: in the past, prestigious schools = substitute proof of ability; now, prestigious schools = opportunity amplifiers, but prestigious schools are no longer a guarantee for people to acquire abilities and gain advantages.

Without the “aura of a famous school”, he is an outstanding Chinese lawyer in New Zealand!

Thank you to this barrister for your “generous decryption”! His life is an “inspirational poem”!

Coming from Taiwan, I have been deeply interested in automobiles and automobile machinery since I was a child. When I was in high school, I chose a private high-tech automobile maintenance department in Taipei City. At that time, I bought a second-hand old car and disassembled the engine in detail, and then reassembled it to study the engine’s starting principle. Following his interests, he found that many things had their own logic and reason.

After graduating from high school, he worked as a “car repairman” at a BMW auto repair shop for a while, and then served two years in the military. After he was discharged, he returned to the automobile company for two years, and then transferred to Canada to complete his undergraduate degree. During this period, he became very interested in law. Due to the situation and language skills at the time, he believed that the time was not yet ripe to directly enter the legal profession. After graduating from university, he returned to Taiwan from Canada and immigrated to New Zealand soon after. He was initially engaged in export trade such as milk powder and served as an accounting department manager. Later, he completed an MBA from Massey University. In 2006, he obtained a bachelor’s degree in law from the University of Auckland.

From Taiwan, Canada to New Zealand, from advanced engineering, universities, MBA classes to law departments, the diversity of his job fields is amazing. Such a rich life experience, the foundation and strength it has created cannot be replaced by the “aura of a famous school”. When he was studying in high school, he wanted to understand the original English maintenance manuals of imported cars, which inspired him to work hard and learn English well.

There are currently about 16,000 registered lawyers in New Zealand, and only a few of them have “Level 4 Criminal Lawyer” qualifications, which is the highest level of trial defense lawyers in New Zealand’s judicial system. When a person involved in a major criminal case requires legal aid, the defense lawyer must be recognized by the Ministry of Justice. For several years, the protagonist in this “inspirational poem” was the only Chinese lawyer with the qualification of “Level 4 Criminal Lawyer”.

He said: “I have determined from the beginning to be a trial defense lawyer, because only in the face of debates with judges and juries can I have the opportunity to fully discuss my legal opinions.”

The six key words that run through this “inspirational poem” are interest, logic, hard work, learning English well, persistence and dreams. Six things have made this outstanding Chinese lawyer. The combined force of these six things is far more powerful than the “aura of a famous school”! After many years of legal work, he found that very few Chinese immigrants held judicial positions. What I can confirm from the exchange is that it is his dream to become a judge in New Zealand.

Many parents told me: “If their children cannot go to Stanford, MIT, or Ivy League schools when they study in the United States, they might as well go to the University of Auckland!” How strange! Why did studying at the University of Auckland become such an embarrassing thing? This idea seriously misunderstands the meaning and value of studying abroad.

From a car mechanic to a top criminal lawyer, his highest academic qualification is a master’s degree from Massey University, and his top university is the University of Auckland. From primary school to university, there was no “aura of prestigious schools” blessing, and I never followed the traditional elite route of elite schools. With hard work and true ability, he was himself, achieved his own success, and embarked on a more solid life trajectory. I believe that both he and his parents possess extraordinary wisdom.

I hope parents and children who are confused by the “prestigious school complex” can get some insights from this true story.

from”10Greatest college dropout” Speaking of!

The American “TIME” magazine once selected the top 10 most outstanding college dropouts, led by Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who is known as “the most successful Harvard dropout in history.” Whether Bill Gates’s two-year undergraduate career at Harvard has become the feast of his life, only he knows.

The late inventor Buckminster Fuller, who twice dropped out of Harvard, had 28 patented inventions, including the geodesic dome design that was used in various dome buildings. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook in his Harvard dormitory. After becoming famous, he dropped out of school to start his own business. Golf star Tiger Woods majored in economics and played amateur golf at Stanford University. He dropped out of school two years later and became a professional golfer. Although they failed to obtain diplomas from prestigious schools, they have become top figures in the industry with their personal qualifications and hard work.

If you use “awakening to the famous school complex” or “anti-prestigious school” to interpret the above-mentioned people as dropping out of prestigious schools, that is unrealistic and too high-level. The essence of these dropout stories is that they believe that “seizing special opportunities” is more important.

Faced with the undercurrent of college students dropping out of school and entering the workplace early, Thomas Neff, chairman of the human resources consulting company, pointed out that only those who think they are creative are suitable for dropping out of school. If a person has a great idea and can obtain funding from venture capital companies, why not seize the diamond opportunity to start a business? Because, by the time you graduate from college, someone else may have stolen your idea.

Thomas Neff further reminded young people that if they want to work in large companies, a college degree is still the basic requirement. More and more companies require a master’s degree to be a manager. According to statistics, nearly two-thirds of corporate CEOs have a master’s degree or above in business administration or law. What about the charm of a prestigious school degree? Human resources companies unanimously believe that after a person has worked for several years or changed jobs several times, his work experience is far more important than academic qualifications. When selecting CEOs or senior executives, the candidate’s work experience is the key.

The other six “top 10 most outstanding college dropouts” are not dropouts from “Ivy League schools”. They are Apple founder Steve Jobs, the late architect Frank Lloyd Wright who designed and supervised the construction of the “Guggenheim Museum”, James Cameron, the great film director of “Titanic” and “Avatar”, and the superb acting star Tom Hanks. Hanks), Harrison Ford, who became popular in movies such as “Star Wars” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” and popular pop singer Lady Gaga.

A closer look at the “Top 10 Most Outstanding College Dropouts” selected by Time Magazine, and their achievements further prove that personal traits such as interest, hard work, talent, and insistence on being themselves are more reliable than the “aura of a prestigious school.”

How much do you know about the stories of tragedy and frustration in chasing the halo of a prestigious school?

In the first week of March 2015, two freshmen at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) committed suicide, shocking the American higher education community. MIT quickly asked professors to reduce students’ coursework, and many professors postponed assignments and exams. Some professors even changed their courses to visit museums near the school to help students relieve stress. Principal L. Rafael Reif sent an email to comfort teachers and students at the school, saying: “This is a time when we need to care for each other and understand each other.”

After the incident, the Boston Globe wrote an article analyzing that MIT is one of the schools with high suicide rates in the United States. It also pointed out that in the past five years, an average of 12.5 students per 100,000 students at the school committed suicide, which is higher than the national average suicide rate.

Many MIT students admit that campus culture forces students to pursue extreme performance, and many people lose their normal social life and mental health as a result. The school stated that MIT students generally have great ambitions, but some students are not equipped to face setbacks and handle pressure.

According to a report by ABC News in early February 2016, in order to prevent a recurrence of the tragedy of seven suicide cases in two years, a number of MIT students and alumni launched a suicide prevention plan and designed a variety of prevention and treatment mechanisms, hoping to help students in a timely manner to reduce the suicide rate. The school has also hired more psychological counselors, extended consultation hours, and even started implementing the Puppy Lab program, bringing dogs with psychological healing capabilities to the campus.

Such tragedies do not happen only at MIT. According to data from Princeton University and media, at least eight current students have died in the four years from 2021 to 2025, four of which were confirmed to be suicides. Since 1876, Princeton student suicide cases have accounted for more than 19% of the total in the past decade; a quarter of undergraduate suicide cases occurred after 2013.

Teacher Wu, a Chinese-American who has worked as a college admission counselor at a high school in Los Angeles for many years, said that she has seen many Chinese-American students who graduated from Ivy League schools find themselves unable to find jobs for a long time after graduation and had to go home to live with their parents. There are also many other graduates from prestigious schools who have fallen into long-term confusion due to lack of practical ability or mental toughness after entering the workplace. Although this is not as tragic as a suicide tragedy, it is at least a frustration of the famous school complex!

In this era of rapid change where AI dominates, what really determines a person’s level is no longer which school he attended. The key is whether he has the ability to continue learning, evolving, and creating value in any environment. While we are still anxious about whether to get into a prestigious school, the world is already using another set of standards to redefine success.

One of the instigators of the above-mentioned tragedy and frustration is the famous school complex! In fact, the school that is suitable for your learning and growth is a famous school!