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I've been asked in a couple of interviews what year I graduated from college. Of course, I think an offer should be made contingent on showing proof of degree with transcripts that will indicate graduation date.

One of the jobs I landed, so it wasn't a big deal. That was several years ago. I didn't get the most recent one. Personally, it was a sign the person didn't know what they were doing and probably did me a favor. There were several indicators that I would not like the job.

Is this a form of age discrimination I need to look out for in the future?

EDIT: Just had another one like this. I usually list relavent experience going back ~12 yrs to keep the resume length shorter and was asked if this was my first job (refering to the oldest position listed). To top it off, the person refered to me as "... a young man like you." It was a phone interview.

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    It is not appropriate for them to ask you that, but proving age discrimination can be incredibly difficult. I feel your pain, not so much on age discrimination but companies that engage in legally questionable activities. Sometimes it really doesn't directly affect you but when you see illegal things going on around you it really crushes morale.
    – maple_shaft
    Jul 15, 2012 at 19:58
  • What country? This is pretty much a US-only issue. In Germany, for example, your resume always starts with age & family status. Trying to hide your age is as silly as trying to hide gender: they'll find out anyway, so why bother obscuring it?
    – Hilmar
    Apr 23, 2016 at 13:39
  • @Hilmar - The country is the US and no one puts their age and definitely not their family status. There is a difference between hiding your age and making sure it isn't a factor in job placement. There is a huge push for "corporate culture" and often that involves age discrimination. I notice you didn't post much on your profile.
    – user8365
    Apr 30, 2016 at 2:06
  • Lol... Good luck proving a discrimination case in the US. Some folks in the US are pretty brazen about it... In one in-person interview I attended, there was a bunch of young grads and self-taught developers. One of the team members said I could be the "token senior member" or something similar. At another interview I attended, the manager did not hire me and told me he was concerned I could not keep up with younger team members.
    – user25792
    Jul 22, 2019 at 6:33
  • I graduated in 1983, and I’m 19 years old.
    – gnasher729
    Mar 24, 2023 at 11:53

4 Answers 4

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Many resources that discuss permissible questions state that asking when a candidate graduated from high school is not a permissible question. Typically, a person is about 18 when they graduate high school, so knowing a high school graduation year can be used to get pretty close to someone's actual age. However, I didn't see any examples or cases where someone was asked their year of college graduation, but I would suspect that it's harder to obtain someone's age with it - there are different length programs, people graduate at different rates due to any number of circumstances, people who hold multiple degrees, and so on. The general rule of thumb from an interviewing perspective is to not ask any questions that can be perceived as being used to determine someone's age.

To me, questions about marital status, age, religion, citizenship or national origin tend to be red flags. The hiring process is a first interaction with a company, so if they are careless with the law in this regard, that could be indicative of other problems in the organization. However, if you suspect some form of illegal things happening, it's more appropriate to consult a lawyer who specializes in the nuances of this aspect of the law.

It should be noted that the US federal law that prohibits age discrimination, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, only protects individuals of at least 40 years of age and only in companies with 20 or more employees. Individual states might extend protections to a wider portion of the population.

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    There is more variation in age at college graduation, but the graduation year still sets a lower bound on age that's pretty reliable, child prodigies aside. If the candidate graduated in 1980 it's safe to assume he's over 40, which (in the US) is the threshold for age discrimination.
    – Monica Cellio
    Jul 16, 2012 at 15:26
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    I don't know if they were trying to determine if I was 22 or 30, but it was obvious I'm over 40.
    – user8365
    Sep 13, 2012 at 12:45
  • @MonicaCellio: Do you agree that college graduation year is relevant? That is, if I got my CS degree in 1980, I probably learned FORTRAN and submitted batch jobs on punched cards; if I graduated in 2010, I probably learned Java and did HTML. That definitely seems as important as whether they graduated at all or from what school.
    – Gabe
    Aug 18, 2014 at 19:21
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    @Gabe there's still variation among schools, so just having the year doesn't help all that much. If you want to know what the person studied in school, ask that. But if you graduated in 1980 and have been working in the field since then, I really hope nobody cares what you studied.
    – Monica Cellio
    Aug 18, 2014 at 19:29
  • @Gabe If you're concerned about those things, you ask "Can you talk about projects you have worked on that used FORTRAN/Java/HTML?" Why the beat around the bush? Just get to the point.
    – Nelson
    Sep 29, 2016 at 16:41
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I feel the pain - and I can see how there's a definite typical flow that lines up to the general rule of thumb that most folks are under 25 when they finish their undergrad (and even their grad work if they have a conjoined degree or streamlined system).

However, I have to say there are also valid reasons for asking this - at least in the computer industry - but perhaps in many engineering or science related areas - there's a big difference in the type of education you received in various decades. If the technical worker hasn't kept up with with these innovations, it's valid to say he isn't qualified to work in an workplace that relies upon the latest and greatest technologoies.

That's not to say that a degree in 1980 isn't a valid credential - especially if follow up education (course work, bootcamps, seminars, self-study, on-the-job education) supports the fact that this person has kept up with the trends and best practices. But the interviewer is well within their rights to verify that their is qualifying experience here.

And I'd think that any battle over ageism would take this into account. I don't think you can reasonably dodge the question without raising red flags about being defensive.

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    I was so put off the second time, I said "Why don't you just ask me how old I am?" The person couldn't have missed the experience and recent certification. At this point in my career, my degree isn't very important since it's not even in CS.
    – user8365
    Sep 13, 2012 at 12:48
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Its a great question to be asked.. .because it immediately tells you to stop talking about your tech skills and start talking up your interpersonal, experience and general "wisdom" skills. They're obviously going to take age into account, to your detriment, so this is an opportunity to fight back at it, to explain that they need some old guys on the team to help mitigate the excesses of the youngsters, bring some long-term stability, not job-hop, etc etc etc.

I suppose if you're at interview, and they're discriminating based on age, then you've already lost - I'm sure you don't look as smooth and sprightly as a 20 year old, so they can tell your rough age already. If a telephone interview, then its a judgement call whether to appear younger than you are, you may get to a face-to-face interview only to find you've wasted your time if they're never going to hire older people.

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  • But graduation date doesn't necessarily correlate well with age. For instance, I didn't get a BS until my mid-30s, and an MS a couple of decades after that. Can't say that it's ever hurt my job hunting, though. If anything, it perhaps leads potential employers to think I'm rather younger than I actually am.
    – jamesqf
    May 27, 2015 at 21:03
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According to the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, federal law against age discrimination in the US only applies to people 40 and older. https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/age.cfm It is completely legal to say, "We prefer a 40 year old to a 30 year old." It is not legal to say "We prefer a 50 year old to a 40 year old" or vice versa.

So I don't see how it could be illegal to ask questions intended to determine your age. Maybe, possibly, if you are obviously over 40 it could be an issue.

If someone asked me for my graduation date, I think I'd say, "I'm not sure. The calendar hadn't been invented yet when I graduated."

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