Comment by laidoffamazon
14 days ago
Not a failure at all, but Stanford Masters isn't nearly as selective as MIT undergrad or Stanford undergrad.
He also graduated at the age of ~29. Not sure if it was a full-time MS or a part-time program paid for by his employer.
I'd check your numbers on that from 30 years ago. They weren't even in the same universe of selectivity as they are now. Full-time/part-time is totally irrelevant. What, are you the most elitist credentialist of all time lol? Jesus.
It's relevant - some companies have seats effectively reserved for them at good grad schools for masters programs for their employees, even today at less prestigious companies like Carrier and GE - the selectivity isn't based on who won beauty pageants or had 7 first author NeurIPS papers like it is for typical MBA and PhD programs at the same institutions.
Getting a Stanford MS while working was somewhat normal then (possible for mere mortals and not superhumans) if you worked at the right company, not really the same as getting into undergrad at all.