Unfortunately my cs degree was from a state school and I've only worked enterprisey jobs with the current misfortune of an architect title. I still have other paths to financial success like consulting or management (hell no).
Fortunately the problem that the company was trying to solve was actually a bit technically challenging (though quite boring from a user facing perspective) and I was able to jump to a better startup and then a better one because I had good experience.
I've only had three jobs since college, but the ability to bring value on the very first day in all three jobs has given me a great deal of credibility, even without a CS degree, and now I'm making quite a bit more than a recent CS grad, though it took me a while to get there (I'm in my early thirties).
While I learned a long time ago that a degree (and even a master's degree, can't speak to fresh PhDs as I've not had the opportunity to work with any) from a prestigious university is not worth the paper it's printed on as far as judging someone's ability to actually ship good code, it seems that lots of SV firms hiring people right out of college think it is.
It's foolish on the part of said firms, but the answer is to take a job at a company that's not a "unicorn" and build up experience (and proof of experience, e.g. shipped products) such that one's "pedigree" is fucking irrelevant.
Honestly, if the job was just a CRUD job, and you're fresh out of college, you don't fucking want it. You need to get out of your comfort zone if you want good experience.