This is an important question. The bottom line answer by any objective manager / recruiter would be that what really counts is the character, attitude, personal skills and knowledge of the person under consideration, regarding of what university he / she graduated from. Having said that, we all know that perceptions prevail…. In other words, statistical probability lead employers to value more graduates of well established universities… whether it is the American University in Cairo, Ain



Shams, Cairo or Alexandria University. There are lots of reasons for this, in the case of well

established universities (Cairo, Alexandria etc…), they are perceived to have relatively better professors, and to get admitted to them, your high school grades should be relatively high. If your high

school exam grades (Thanaweya Amma) do not allow you to a public university, then you settle for a private university, a private university (such as MSA, October etc…) or an academy (such as Modern Academy or El Shorouk). We all agree that grades are not the most objective measure of someone's skills and qualities… however, lacking other way of measurement… and actually having lots of supply from graduates from other 'perceived' better universities… why should selective employers bother (eg. For a multinational company or a bank) ? Again, while it is not the right and objective thing to do… this is the perception. The same apply to the American University in Cairo (AUC), people know it offers better quality education, due to the limited number of students, its stress on research, classroom work and being taught in English…. On the other hand there are AUC graduates that are useless and of poor caliber. The law of probability, or the perception of the average AUC student drive people to believe that it is a better choice than the average public university student to hire.

Luckily, the issue of which university, institute or academy one graduated from becomes less and less important as one advances in his / her career. Hence, after a few years of work experience, what really counts would be the person's on the job skills, ability to assume more responsibilities, meet deadlines etc…. So, it should gradually fade away.

As for what you can do about it, well you will not change people's general perceptions about the educational entities, you should focus on becoming presentable, very well behaved, mature, reliable, punctual, trust worthy, able to work with others, fluent in at least one language, good with PCs, and constantly keen to develop your knowledge (both general knowledge and the specialized one relevant to your work). Becoming a true professional is what really differentiates people at work, and helps advancing one's career.

yes this topic worries me too