# uk Dopers-Do You Advertise Your Children's Universities? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 21, 2008, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169 "2008-03-21T01:02:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/1 "2008-03-21T01:02:35Z")
On your car’s rear window? I finfd this (American) custom pretty weird-you pay 25,000$/year to send your kid to a college-then you advertise this? Anyway, do people do this in Great Britain? ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/2 "2008-03-21T03:56:25Z")
Since this seems to be more of a poll than anything else, it’s probably better suited for IMHO. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/3 "2008-03-21T11:52:23Z")
I’ve never seen anything of the sort. People of a certain character will find every opportunity to boast about their children’s achievements when in conversation, but the majority are far more reserved. It’s just not something you brag about, almost in the way you don’t start telling people how much money you’re earning. Of course the subject will arise naturally, but in any case it’s (correctly) viewed very much as the child’s acomplishment, rather than that of the parents. ---
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 12:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/4 "2008-03-21T12:00:19Z")
The stickers on people’s cars here tend to be of their children’s schools, not their universities. I don’t think it’s advertising a family’s wealth, so much as the fact that they’re part of that particular school community. ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/5 "2008-03-21T13:23:45Z")
I’ve never seen it done. Students do wear hoodies with their university’s badge on it, though, and to a lesser extent, their school (faculty). Medics, in particular, seem to take great delight in advertising the fact that they’re medical students. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/6 "2008-03-21T14:02:15Z")
So there’s no stickers or t-shirts or anything that say “All Souls Mom”? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Rayne\_Man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/df705f/32.png) [@Rayne\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rayne_Man)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/7 "2008-03-21T14:27:49Z")
At one time students would wear scarves with the distinctive colours of their university or college. We even had them at the lowly technical college I attended back in the 1960’s. I don’t seem to see them so much now. ---
**Author:** ![Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4da419/32.png) [@Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gala_Matrix_Fire)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/8 "2008-03-21T15:51:53Z")
I’m wondering why you assume it’s the child’s university and not the parents’ university. It’s not as if universities were just invented in the last five years. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/9 "2008-03-21T16:03:38Z")
The car stickers for universities are usually the alma mater (or current school) of the person owning the car. The “my kid is an honor student at Bailley Elementary” obviously aren’t. Its a college pride thing - sometimes tied to college snobbery, sometimes tied to the fact that you need everyone to know you support Nebraska in football. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/10 "2008-03-21T21:11:56Z")
[QUOTE=Gala Matrix Fire] I’m wondering why you assume it’s the child’s university and not the parents’ university. [/QUOTE] My guess is because the stickers often explicitly say it’s the parent. [Here’s one](http://www.collegegear.com/sf/stores/1172/p-177593.shtml) from the university I attended. We saw plenty like [these](http://www.collegegear.com/sf/stores/1172/p-23852.shtml) on parents’ cars when we were freshmen, too. ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/11 "2008-03-21T21:51:58Z")
[QUOTE=Dangerosa] The car stickers for universities are usually the alma mater (or current school) of the person owning the car. [/QUOTE] Or the university whose football team you’re a fan of. ---
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2008, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/12 "2008-03-21T22:14:10Z")
[QUOTE=elfkin477] My guess is because the stickers often explicitly say it’s the parent. [/QUOTE] I’ve never seen the “parent” style here. The stickers usually just display the school’s crest. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2008, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/13 "2008-03-22T03:19:26Z")
In these here parts the only adverts I see for a university on a person (ie not general advertising in print or other media) would be a sports sweatshirts or maybe a college branded credit card as wielded by alumni. We don’t pay fees to go to university here and although one or two are more prestigious there really isn’t much of a gap between one university and another here. ---
**Author:** ![Hippy\_Hollow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hippy_hollow/32/4841_2.png) [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2008, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uk-dopers-do-you-advertise-your-childrens-universities/442169/14 "2008-03-22T03:24:43Z")
I have to think most of the parent-centric stickers are taking the piss (“My kid and my money go to TEXAS”) or are bought by the kids themselves (“TEXAS Mom”). If people are going out any buying their own paraphernalia, why not just get the “TEXAS” sticker? It makes you sound cooler, and nobody’s going to come up to you on the highway and say, “Now did you actually go to Texas, or did your kid?”