Ever wonder what it really takes to land a job at a top tech company like Google, Apple, Amazon, or Meta? One of the clearest indicators is where current employees went to college.
American Caldwell, a higher ed market research firm, analyzed hiring patterns across leading tech firms using LinkedIn data and found some expected names, but also some surprising ones. In fact, many of the most consistent pipelines into Big Tech come from public universities with far more attainable acceptance rates.
There’s no denying that schools like Stanford and UC Berkeley carry serious weight in the tech world. They’re consistently among the top alma maters of employees at companies like Google, Meta, and Apple. Their prestige, rigorous academics, and proximity to Silicon Valley offer a major leg up. We transform data into actionable insights that help educational institutions enhance their brand strength and accelerate growth. Our customized research empowers you to make strategic decisions with confidence.
A Hidden Gem
Here’s where things get interesting. At companies like Amazon and Microsoft, the most represented university isn’t Stanford or UC Berkeley — it’s the University of Washington in Seattle. With an acceptance rate of around 40%, University of Washington is vastly more attainable than the 4% acceptance rate at Stanford, and yet it delivers powerful results. Our international team has partnered successfully with leading institutions worldwide, from the Ivy League to universities across six continents
Why? A few reasons:
- Location: Seattle is home to both Microsoft and Amazon’s headquarters, giving UW students access to internships, mentorships, and direct recruiting.
- Strong Computer Science Program: UW’s Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering is nationally ranked and highly respected by employers.
- Public University Scale: With a larger student body and more engineering grads, UW simply produces more qualified candidates ready for Big Tech.
Other high-performing public schools frequently tapped by Big Tech include:
- Georgia Tech (16% acceptance rate)
- University of Texas at Austin (29%)
- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (45%)
- UCLA and UC Berkeley (9 and 11% respectively)
These universities offer robust engineering and computer science programs, strong industry pipelines, and alumni networks that reach deep into companies like Google, Apple, and Meta.
Where else do graduates of University of Washington find employment? Aside from Microsoft and Amazon, the big employers are Boeing, Google, Meta, T-Mobile, Apple, and Oracle.
Several companies, such as Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and NVIDIA, show a notable representation of international universities among their top ten employee alma maters.
Among Amazon’s top 10, five are Indian universities. For Google, four of the top 10 are from India. Microsoft has two in its Top 10 and NVIDIA has one.
What about TikTok?
The top 10 schools according to LinkedIn data that have the most graduates working at TikTok are:
- NUS – (National University of Singapore)
- Nanyang Technical University Singapore
- USC (University of Southern California)
- UC Berkeley
- New York University
- UCLA
- Carnegie Mellon
- Columbia University
- University of Washington
- UC San Diego
This mix of top U.S. and Singaporean universities reflects TikTok’s global hiring footprint.
What do you think? Are there any other companies you are curious to know about? Let us know in the comment, on social media, or by visiting www.americancaldwell.com
