[Tenobrus]

Sure, this is probably true for people directly looking for jobs on the market. But I'd say most top students are getting internships pre-graduation and getting good return offers, or just using career fairs (that are targeting new grads specifically). From what I've seen that path can get them much higher than average salaries directly out of college, without any experience to speak of (an internship or two and some small side projects). After that first job it may not matter, but there are very large starting salary differences based on college name and performance.

[smsm42]

Open source/volunteer projects are great at building resume pre-employment. With additional bonus that you can actually show the potential employer your code and not just talk about it. And if you managed to actually run an OSS project while being a student, instead of merely submitting patches to it, that's even more excellent news.

College name - sure, if it's MIT, maybe. Or a handful of others. Otherwise - meh, in software world nobody really cares. In business or law maybe different, don't know.

[afuchs]

Open Source and volunteer projects help, if one has time to complete them. If one has to work multiple low-wage jobs to make ends meet, ignoring other burdens, then their options are more limited.