My wife recently completed her MBA (Masters Business Administration) course of study, and our neighbor suggested that she have her hood and tassel displayed in a shadow box, which would be hung on a wall in the area of our house we use as an office.
I have never heard of this practice. I surmise that visitors to our home might view it as pretentious.
What do you guys think?
In an home office setting, I would think not if visitors rarely/never go in there. Displayed on an altar in the living room would be a bit much. 
I’ve seen it done before. Never thought anything about it to be honest. Since it’s in a room you use as an office I definitely wouldn’t think negatively of it at all.
In your home office, that’s fine. It’s just a nice little congrats to herself that few people are going to see. Hanging in the office at work, or better yet, tacking it onto her name in her e-mail signature line (like a certain, annoying coworker of mine) is pretty obnoxious.
I don’t see how it’s different from displaying a graduation photo, or a certificate. Round my way, people tend to put these things in the downstairs guest toilet, where guests will see it, but in a rather informal setting.
I had one of those coworkers too. Really grated, as she was useless at her job.
I think it sounds pretentious.
But if most of your visitors are casual, friends and family types-- as opposed to business connections, it’s harmless.
Frankly, a lot of my problem with it in a more business-y environment is that my perception is that an MBA is a fairly meaningless credential. Vitally necessary to work in some locations/fields, and getting one from a more prestigious institution can’t hurt the networking opportunities, but . . . the MBA itself is incidental.
(Of course, I’m overeducated and underemployed, and don’t have an MBA so what do I know?)
I can’t vote in the poll, because I feel it is both pretentious and harmless.
That’s why I’m on the fence. We do not have a dedicated room to use as an office. If we had a room where a door could be closed upon it, I wouldn’t think twice. Our office space shares room with our kitchen and laundry area. It’s a large addition broken up into three distinct areas. Anyone who visits our kitchen would see it. We already have the diploma on the wall above our PC, and the thought was to have them installed side by side.
Hopefully that clarifies and explains why I’m undecided.
Thanks for all the responses so far. I do appreciate it.
Home or office is acceptable. She’s achieved something worthwhile, and should be proud of it.
But not too much…
Well played, Ducati.
MBA’s seem to have serious self-esteem problems.
I’d say go for it. Something like that could be interesting from an aesthetic standpoint, since those hoods are often colorful, and it would be a conversation piece that would be more interesting (to me, anyway) than a bunch of pictures of your relatives that I’ve never met. I don’t see it as being any different from putting up sports trophies or the like.
The only thing that would make it inappropriate would be your possible actions around it. If you’re saying “So… did you notice my MBA hood?” or “Oh, I see you’re standing next to my MBA hood” then I’m going to be more than just annoyed.
But that’s no different from the lady who spends an hour talking about how her son earned a participation trophy in his T-ball league.
What is your wife’s view of this? I hear you’re undecided. Personally, I don’t do it (with my JD hood). I think it’s harmless *and *pretentious. Harmlessly pretentious or pretentiously harmless. People put diplomas on their walls, this is at least more attractive. As you can tell, I’m undecided.
Dude, it’s in your own house. I’d build a giant shrine to myself in my living room if I weren’t so dang lazy. But seriously now, it’s not like she’s wallpapering the place with copies of her diploma. Having that up in a place that only visitors in your kitchen would see isn’t a big deal. Not something I would do, but meh.
She was all for it, until I advised that I’d never heard of anyone doing it, and wondering if it was a little over the top…
She’s still all for it, provided it isn’t obviously going to ping people’s douchemeters. If it’s going to be interpreted as blatant attention whoring, she’ll just store it somewhere more private. If it’s socially acceptable, she’d like to do it.
Never heard of the hood / tassel thing. That plus displaying the diploma sounds like overkill, unless the hood matches your color scheme or something LOL
The customary practice is to frame the certificates or diplomas and put those on display. For example, I have my college degrees framed and on the wall, and a buddy has his degree and his Army commission framed and on the wall.
I’d just stay with the diploma on the wall; it tells anyone who sees it everything that matters. Sticking the graduation regalia on the wall is just kind of weird, IMO. It would be like my buddy framing his uniform or something like that.
Not pretentious at all. Tacky as hell, though.
I think that a more accurate comparison would be vets who display a folded flag, along with their awards, which is incredibly common among military retirees. Not so much among veterans who did one or two tours before being discharged. Nobody wears a graduation hood to work every day. It is not a uniform. It is a symbol of a specific achievement, much like an Army Achievement Medal. IMO, it represents a higher level of achievement than a branch specific achievement medal. (and I say this as a person who has received service awards, but not academic awards.)
I think my parents have my high school cap pinned up on a wall somewhere. I think it’s kind of silly.
If you really want to display the tassel, I say frame it along with the diploma in a single display, like so.
