2008 US News Rankings

<p>the tier rankings seems pretty good (obviously we can all quibble about moving ups and downs) but generally it's pretty good. I too found it very strange that berkeley was tier three, def. tier 2 or maybe tier 1. ucla should definitely be moved up. many students are not just looking to go to a certain type of school, they apply to both lacs and private research univs and state schools with the hope to just get a good education and be around smart students who will influence them and whom they can learn from, so clubbing schools into tiers makes some sense.</p>

<p>bruno123,
Part of my problem with the current PA (and what I am guessing it is measuring) is that it leaves the judgment to only one group (others in the academics area) that is exposed to faculty and we don't know which of them responded nor do we know what they value in their evaluations (research work? teaching effectiveness? what??). </p>

<p>I have frequently advocated for additional opinions of what faculty bring to the table. IMO students have the most on the line when they make a college choice and I ask what good does it do any student if the teachers are lousy teachers or maybe only available on a limited basis (or even not at all)? Students can make pretty insightful judgments about college professors and I think you are selling them short if you think it is like high school and they just go for the so-called “popular” professors. Granted, students can only opine effectively for their own school, but I would think that their views would act as a good check on the reputation of the faculty and would certainly be of great interest to prospective students. </p>

<p>Furthermore, if future employers perceive the students coming from a school as particularly well prepared (eg, Wharton students going to Wall Street), shouldn’t this view be considered and given some benefit (or conversely, if employers think that students coming from XYZ college are NOT well prepared by the faculty for the real world)? Getting a good job in the postgraduate market is a major reason for many, many students to go to college in the first place. Are those students getting a good bang for their buck? </p>

<p>I think that the primary purpose of an undergraduate college is to educate students and not to promote the professional reputation of a faculty member as determined by his/her research activities. I hear often the arguments about the various awards and research efforts of faculty and how this determines their intra-professional reputation, but I sometimes struggle to see the connection between these honors and the undergraduate college experience and the education of the student?</p>

<p>Hawkette. Asking students to rate professors has its value, internally, at individual colleges/universities. It is useful, along with anecdotal commentary, to help students select from professors who are generally perceived to be good teachers. But beware. Often students' assessments can become personal, giving high marks to teachers they like, or have given good grades for average work, or.....on and on. Do we really want, however, to see those students opinions mixed into a national...or more accurately, international ranking system? Nah.
One more thing I think it fair to tell you, before you assume that I have a particular point of view because I have mentioned that I have been a college prof. While this is true, as I have been an adjunct prof for many years, it has not been my main profession...rather I have been teaching young people what I have learned from my other endeavors.</p>

<p>Also, Hawkette, if I am understanding your vote, to have employers assess the educations provided by the various institutions, wouldn't your argument about companies hiring more from schools in their own backyards, because they are familiar with those particular schools, tend to mitigate your argument? Are you are saying the value of those employers' opinions, who might be rating the schools on a national level, should be the same employers who (according to my understanding of your view) prefer hiring from their own areas because of their general familiarity with the neighboring schools? Am I missing something, here? Yet educational professionals cannot possibly have all of the necessary information to rank all institutions of higher learning?</p>

<p>One more thought, Hawkette. Graduate rankings for business and law (not sure about the others) generally tell the public how many graduates are employed upon graduation, along with starting salaries. I think that this is where this info belongs. I cannot tell you how many kids do not go on to be gainfully employed after college. Many travel the world, travel across country, join the Peace Corps, or Teach for America. Some do the JET program in Japan, and some go directly onto grad school...You see, so many are not ready to settle into a career-type job, understanding full well that they will probably have to go to grad school before establishing any sort of meaningful career. Unfortunately for most of our kids, undergraduate work is just the first step. They need to move on to grad school, generally speaking, to have solid careers. ANd this brings us back to Peer Assessment (unfortunately), because grad schools are very cognizant of the philosophies and programs at the different undergrad schools, and they do put a certain weight on that when deciding whether or not to accept a particular applicant. THAT IS ONE VERY MAJOR REASON WHY PEER ASSESSMENT IS SO VERY IMPORTANT, AND PROBABLY WHY OUR EUROPEAN COUNTERPARTS GIVE IT SO MUCH WEIGHT.</p>

<p>gabriellah,
I guess I just have a higher view of the value of student opinion and its use and here’s one reason why. </p>

<p>Pretend you are looking for a great college to attend. ABC college has a great reputation in academic circles and a high PA score, but the professors who were mainly responsible for this reputation either 1) don’t teach undergraduates; 2) teach undergraduates but only do so in large courses and the great bulk of the teaching is done in small groups by TAs; 3) teach undergrads, but are lousy in the classroom and students don’t learn effectively. </p>

<p>So, in any of these three scenarios, the student experience as an undergrad is significantly less than what would be expected given the school’s high PA. Presently, that is not accounted for anywhere in the rankings and I think it should be. Again, my interest is the student and what kind of experience he or she will have as an undergraduate student. If one prioritizes institutional research efforts as a more important goal of the college, then that is fine, but it is different than what most prospective students are expecting and this should be better disclosed and understood. A student assessment of faculty quality (with ranking consequences) would reveal if there was a campus disconnect between faculty reputation and actual learning in the classroom.</p>

<p>gabriellah,
Re employer opinions, I don’t think that they would be any more limited than the current group opining on faculty quality except that they would have a different focus, ie, how good and how well-prepared are the students that they see coming out of ABC college. I would expect employers to have a very good view of some schools, a modest view of some others and no view at all about many. But if you use as many employer data points as the PA survey now tries to gather (1300+ colleges and 3 views from each school, I think) and uses a fair geographic distribution, then a mosaic will evolve and I would expect a useful result. </p>

<p>I’m sure that the PA rating system has evolved over the years and I would expect a student and corporate assessment would do the same. To me, the issue is not that it be done absolutely perfectly from day one, but to decide whether it is a worthwhile thing to do and then employ an iterative process and reach a useful result after a few years of development. As I think I have made clear, I think that the effort to get the input of students and employers has real value to prospective college students and IMO this value far outweighs the objections that are being raised. </p>

<p>Re your comments about the postgraduate employment data, I understand your objections and concur that one can’t draw absolute conclusions about undergraduate colleges from such data. But would the data have some value for those looking at ABC college and XYZ university and trying to decide which school will give him/her the best launching pad if immediate postgraduate work is an objective? I think that it would and if I am a high school student trying to pick between these two schools, then this might be the critical, deciding factor. </p>

<p>Finally, re graduate schools, I think you would have to be a member of the admissions committee at multiple graduation schools to claim that PAs are such a critical factor in determining in grad school admissions. They may be for some and have some influence for some disciplines, but this is far from universal (MBA schools being an obvious exception as their priority by far is work experience). Personally, I would love to see data, such as # of applications and # of acceptances to so-called “elite” graduate programs, but I doubt we’ll ever get the schools to release this.</p>

<p>You know, Hawkette, I guess what makes this conversation so interesting is the different vantage points we are coming from. With no difference in opinion, there would be no worthwhile conversation, and we certainly are having an interesting debate on the issue of peer assessment.
I come from the position of being a parent who has been educating her children on the college and graduate school levels for the past ten years. That means from orientation, to grad school, to career...Door-to-door, so to speak. My commentary is derived from a purely "mom" experiential point of view. Of course, I am sure that my professional work has filtered into my opinions somewhat. To me, your approach seems more theoretical than practical. Are you basing your thoughts solely on theory? Or have you had personal, practical experiences that have led you to your conclusions? I think understanding our different perspectives would help us (and perhaps the CC readership also interested in this important issue) understand where we, as posters with strong opinions, are coming from.</p>

<p>Anyone know how the engineering schools whose highest level is a doc. rated?</p>

<p>My cousin is a college administrator and I believe receives the USNWR surveys. While I have never spoken to him about the contents and questions in the form, I have often spoken to him about various colleges and universities and have been impressed by his detailed knowledge of certain schools. The information that he appears to know relates to many different areas, including turmoil in the faculty in specific departments, administrations that are feuding with faculty, lack of interest in undergraduate teaching, extreme emphasis on publications, plethora of inexperienced faculty at specific schools etc. I value his opinion highly, and I have always thought that peer assessments can be extremely informative, because people in the academic field know a lot about which schools are on the upswing, which schools are troubled and which schools have excellent teaching etc. </p>

<p>As to employers, I actually don't know how much they could add to the discussion. Most employers would potentially have an opinon only on a few schools at best (including their own alma maters), and their opinion would be colored by the one or two employees they might have who attended a specific university (except for the very largest employers). Also, short of people with professional degrees, many students are actually not "trained" for the work they do and I simply don't know how an employer would judge whether a school was good based upon the work of the employee.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Finally, re graduate schools, I think you would have to be a member of the admissions committee at multiple graduation schools to claim that PAs are such a critical factor in determining in grad school admissions. They may be for some and have some influence for some disciplines, but this is far from universal (MBA schools being an obvious exception as their priority by far is work experience).

[/quote]

Overall PA may not have as much influence on grad admission but departmental PA will. I realize that departmental PA is grad programs but it's basically the same faculty and facilities.</p>

<p>actually those are not right. Penn is tied with Caltech for 5th.</p>

<p>And to all those Penn haters out there, Penn is definitely better than MIT. It should be #4, no doubt.</p>

<p>"And to all those Penn haters out there, Penn is definitely better than MIT. It should be #4, no doubt."</p>

<p>Ok, so Penn is better than MIT. That would make it #5 unless you also think Penn is better than HYPS.</p>

<p>Me, too, Midatlmom. I also don't see the benefit of employers weighing in on the equation. I just don't get it.</p>

<p>Hawkette. Any student or parent of a student who has gone onto a professional graduate school can tell you that a certain prestige factor, relating to what those in academia think of the undergraduate institution, does make an important impact on admissions committees. These admissions committees have not formed their opinions based on what the undergraduate students think of their professors, nor upon what employers think of the undergraduate institution. Believe it, or not, they base their opinions on the general respect accorded those institutions by other educators...known as peers, in USNWR lingo. And I sincerely hope that does not change.</p>

<p>Gabriellaah, Midaltmom, does the corporate world's opinion of universities influence qualilty of education? Most likely not. However, the opinion of the corporate world matters to students who intend to hit the workforce right after graduating from college. And such a survey should not target random employees in random companies, it should target high level executives at major insitutions that are known to recruit college students and put them through a well laid-out training/development program. Ideally, the survey would be filled out by the heads of college recruiting and the heads of the training/development programs.</p>

<p>USNWR Rakings sorted by Peer Assessment Score:</p>

<ol>
<li> Princeton University (NJ) 4.9 </li>
<li> Harvard University (MA) 4.9 </li>
<li> Stanford University (CA) 4.9 </li>
<li> Massachusetts Institute of Technology 4.9 </li>
<li> Yale University (CT) 4.8 </li>
<li> University of California—Berkeley 4.8 </li>
<li> California Institute of Technology 4.7 </li>
<li> Columbia University (NY) 4.6 </li>
<li> University of Chicago 4.6 </li>
<li> Cornell University (NY) 4.6 </li>
<li> Johns Hopkins University (MD) 4.6 </li>
<li> University of Pennsylvania 4.5 </li>
<li> University of Michigan—Ann Arbor 4.5 </li>
<li> Duke University (NC) 4.4 </li>
<li> Brown University (RI) 4.4 </li>
<li> Dartmouth College (NH) 4.3 </li>
<li> Northwestern University (IL) 4.3 </li>
<li> University of Virginia 4.3 </li>
<li> Carnegie Mellon University (PA) 4.2 </li>
<li> University of California—Los Angeles 4.2 </li>
<li> University of North Carolina—Chapel Hill 4.2 </li>
<li> Washington University in St. Louis 4.1 </li>
<li> University of Wisconsin—Madison 4.1 </li>
<li> University of Texas—Austin 4.1 </li>
<li> Rice University (TX) 4.0 </li>
<li> Emory University (GA) 4.0 </li>
<li> Vanderbilt University (TN) 4.0<br></li>
<li> Georgetown University (DC) 4.0 </li>
<li> University of Southern California 4.0 </li>
<li> Georgia Institute of Technology 4.0 </li>
<li> University of Illinois—Urbana - Champaign 4.0 </li>
<li> University of Notre Dame (IN) 3.9 </li>
<li> University of Washington 3.9 </li>
<li> New York University 3.8 </li>
<li> University of California—San Diego 3.8 </li>
<li> University of California—Davis 3.8 </li>
<li> Pennsylvania State University—University Park 3.8 </li>
<li> Purdue University—West Lafayette (IN) 3.8 </li>
<li> College of William and Mary (VA) 3.7</li>
<li> Ohio State University—Columbus 3.7 </li>
<li> University of Minnesota—Twin Cities 3.7</li>
</ol>

<p>Sorry...there is a more complete listing in the "How ridiculous is Peer Assessment" thread.</p>

<p>hawkett,</p>

<p>I found your ideal methodology for rankings to be thought provoking, I'm sure such issues would not have been overlooked by usnews, but i can see a few fundamental reasons why some of your factors are not practical or not properly representative of the quality of education. the idea of asking students to rate professors seems essential (and is within a college) but what completely undermines this, is that kids have no way to compare their teachers to those at other colleges. so a standard is impossible to maintain. the same is said about faculty, but they have a greater understanding of their peers at other schools. students prevent any form of objective comparison. to play the devil's advocate i'd say that if students have school pride they might even just give their faculty excessively high ratings knowing that it will boost their ranking. alumni too have too little scope in their experience to judge faculty relative to other schools.</p>

<p>considering employers was interesting, because i see it's value and it's importance to students, but i have to agree with gabriellah and say that undergraduate schools are geared to far too many fields and aspects of life, making any quantifiable metric far too narrow, and leaving too many intangibles. i mean joining the peace corps is fantastic if you ask me, something meaningful, worthwhile and a great learning experience, but it cannot be quantified or compared in anyway to joining an engineering company or acting troupe. with business and law such comparisons based on employer surveys and starting salaries are possible (imo very important), but between community service, joining international organizations, becoming entrepreneurs, joining something in the fine arts, science research, grad school, wall street, teaching etc etc you would have to measure something that borders on success at life in general, for it to be encompassing enough.</p>

<p>"And to all those Penn haters out there, Penn is definitely better than MIT. It should be #4, no doubt."</p>

<p>Ok, so Penn is better than MIT. That would make it #5 unless you also think Penn is better than HYPS.</p>

<p>haha, those Penn fans need to straighten their number-counting out...</p>

<p>Peer assessment can be very biased. I always ignore that.</p>