A "Better" Ranking System

<p>It seems to me that one significant problem with "revealed preference" is that it only detects preference among colleges that a student has actually applied to.</p>

<p>In fact, most students express their more definitive preferences at an earlier stage- when they choose which colleges to apply to in the first place.</p>

<p>So, for instance, Schools such as MIT, Brigham Young, and Notre Dame have a certain yield, and have their particular levels of preference, among students who have actually applied to them. However, many other students have deliberately not even applied to these schools, because what the schools particularly have to offer is not what those students want.</p>

<p>Not even bothering to apply because you dislike it so much is a more definitive level of "anti-preference" than choosing a different school you've also been accepted to is. But this isn't captured in the "revealed preference" methodology.</p>

<p>
[quote]
No matter how you measure it, no top student as a generalization is able to rank colleges correctly. That Princeton acceptee was top in almost everything and he would've told you UVA > Stanford and other Lower Ivies. Even the best students have state biases, local biases, Ivy biases, and other biases that are much more extreme and common than masters of academics

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Firstly, I don't think Princeton acceptees are top in almost everything, far from it. Your Princeton friend's telling you that UVA > Stanford should actually be taken as an indicator. No, average students at HYPSMC may not be good enough to make a good generalized perception on this matter, but top 1-2% kids from top 20 high schools in the States would likely to occupy the top 0.5% of the top universities. Now it has much credibility as much as the faculty themselves. Do you think your friend belong to the top 1% students at Princeton?</p>

<p>Secondly, neither top students or faculty may rank colleges correctly. They have their own biases, in fact, faculty belong to a very biased group, much more so than recruiters or top students.</p>

<p>rtkysg & johnwesley --</p>

<p>Fair points re CalTech; I had forgotten the revealed preference study discussed that situation separtely (I didn't re-read it). And, yes, Middlebury goes where johnwesley says. Hey, it was late.</p>

<p>I used Princeton as an example. I bet even the 4.0's at Harvard or MIT have biases favoring their state flagships and the like. Just like every single intelligent person I'd met has had biases in favor of UVA.</p>

<p>Prestigious and knowledgable professors (many who have attended different universities) >>>>> any student. </p>

<p>I highly doubt that faculty are on a whole more biased than top students. Will faculty tell you that New York University is an Ivy league? Will faculty tell you that Harvard sucks because they got rejected from it? Will faculty promote their own college just because they were accepted/attending it and diss colleges they were rejected to?</p>

<p>No matter how you put it, faculty are not perfect but are a way better indicator than students. </p>

<p>Also, peer assessment is heavily correlated with recruiter assessment, which is much more important.</p>

<p>Yes, I believe the study is accurate. I mean, didn't they survey a grand total of 3,000 students from a handful of top feeder schools? Not to imply the survey or participants are biased, of course... :rolleyes:</p>

<p>
[quote]
Prestigious and knowledgable professors (many who have attended different universities) >>>>> any student. </p>

<p>I highly doubt that faculty are on a whole more biased than top students. Will faculty tell you that New York University is an Ivy league?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>No single top student (I mean really really top) would tell you NYU is an Ivy League. No offense, but no kid with GPA 4.0 from Harvard or MIT will give you non-sensible info like your friend mentioned before. No top 1% students at Yale or MIT would say Harvard sucks because they've been rejected.</p>

<p>On the other hand, faculty generally only look at how many colleagues they have and distinguished faculty that they adore in a college to determine the ranking. They give insignificant amount of attention to student quality. Recruiter assessment on the other hand put a very strong emphasis on the student quality and I would argue that it has actually higher correlation with top students' view on college ranking.</p>

<p>This is a "new" system? Not hardly. It's been discussed (and its methodology questioned) before.</p>

<p>"No single top student (I mean really really top) would tell you NYU is an Ivy League. No offense, but no kid with GPA 4.0 from Harvard or MIT will give you non-sensible info like your friend mentioned before. No top 1% students at Yale or MIT would say Harvard sucks because they've been rejected.
"</p>

<p>Untrue. Many Yale kids diss Harvard constantly. Go to xoxo and check it out. The top students at xoxo who attend Ivies constantly diss each other. </p>

<p>PS: Top 1%? So I guess you think students who attend non-Ivies are not qualified? How are you basing intelligence off which college you attend? I know idiots at Princeton and geniuses at Northern Virginia Community College. Just surveying students at top universities is very wrong altogether.</p>

<p>I chose a top 25 over Columbia/Cornell because of a full scholarship. So I guess if I was willing to shell out 100+k then I would be allowed to be included in the "Top Student Survey?".</p>

<p>
[quote]
Go to xoxo and check it out. The top students at xoxo who attend Ivies

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Sorry top students at xoxo do not translate into top students at Ivies. You would hardly find any formidable poster like Joe who won Rhodes.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Top 1%? So I guess you think students who attend non-Ivies are not qualified? How are you basing intelligence off which college you attend? I know idiots at Princeton and geniuses at Northern Virginia Community College. Just surveying students at top universities is very wrong altogether

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Of course, a genius may come from anywhere like Eric demaine. But top 1% at Ivies are likely to be better than let's say those top 1% at San Jose State. We just simply take statistics here.</p>

<p>
[quote]
I chose a top 25 over Columbia/Cornell because of a full scholarship. So I guess if I was willing to shell out 100+k then I would be allowed to be included in the "Top Student Survey?".

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I believe none of my post is directed to you personally.</p>

<p>Alright let's say I agree with you. Do you really think this "survey" was indicative of the top 1% of students? </p>

<p>I'd take the top professors over these overall students anyday.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Do you really think this "survey" was indicative of the top 1% of students? </p>

<p>I'd take the top professors over these overall students anyday

[/quote]
</p>

<p>No, this survey is not indicative of the top 1% students. On the other hand there's no indication that US NEWS peer assessment score is canvassed from 'top' professors. Having said that, being a top professor and being a non-biased and knowledgeable one are basically two orthogonal things. I've been working with these so called 'top' professors and you'll be amazed at how biased and indifferent they can be.</p>

<p>i see amherst, williams............in the top 20, THAT indicates they are really surveying top students.</p>

<p>most people outside of the top 1% student body have never heard of those schools nor would they choose them over Duke...etc.</p>

<p>"I agree with GentlemanandScholar. I think Us News's peer ranking's should be the sole ranking." </p>

<p>"Nobody is saying that peer assesment is flawless"</p>

<p>Oh really! Not flawless? That would be the understatement of the year as the peer assessment is the the biggest flaw of the entire USNews report. Contrary to popular belief, the peer assessment is nothing more than an abject exercise of cronyism and gamemanship based on little data and very little integrity.</p>

<p>" Contrary to popular belief, the peer assessment is nothing more than an abject exercise of cronyism and gamemanship based on little data and very little integrity."</p>

<p>Uh, care to back that up with facts, or should we just go with your hunch?</p>

<p>Am I the only one who realizes this ranking is incredibly biased against the public schools? There are plenty of students out there that could get into Notre Dame, Duke, Penn, etc but never apply because they would much rather get a goodat their state flagship university. This may be due to finances or because they just like their state school better academically. Since their state U is likely less selective than these schools, they won't apply to these private schools. These students actually choose their state U over Notre Dame, Duke, etc, there is just no application to document it. This presents a huge flaw in the ranking i think.</p>

<p>all this ranking says is that given 2 schools, a student would more likely choose one over the other. it doesn't have anything to do with 1 school being better than the other. thats why there are 9 rankings - each region of the country has one.</p>

<p>this ranking shows mainly that there are a multitude of reasons why someone would choose 1 school over another - perceived academic quality isn't everything. Why else would a school like chicago rank so lowly? its quality of life isn't that great.</p>

<p>is there life in Chicago AT ALL? ;)</p>

<p>"Uh, care to back that up with facts, or should we just go with your hunch?"</p>

<p>I like my hunches. :)</p>

<p>
[quote]
U.S. News also suggests that it assesses learning through a survey that the magazine sends to university presidents, provosts, and admissions deans requesting them to rank peer schools' academic programs on a scale of one to five. This survey makes up 25 percent of a school's score and, according to U.S. News, "this is how highly knowledgeable college officials rate the educational quality of the schools they feel qualified to rate." That sounds reasonable. But a closer look suggests, not surprisingly, that the college administrators surveyed share the same bias in favor of research that pervades academia. Analysing U.S. News' data, we found that a high reputation score in the college guide correlates much more closely with high per-faculty federal research and development expenditures than with high faculty-student ratios or good graduation-rate performance, the magazine's best measures of undergraduate learning. </p>

<p>By Amy Graham

[/quote]
</p>

<p>PS Amy Graham is the former director of data research for U.S. News & World Report.</p>

<p>This rating system is really odd. How can Syracuse not be in the top 100? Arizona State is ranked better than it. What?</p>

<p>Amy Graham has her opinions about the peer assesment, and so do you and so do I. But maybe these college officials give high marks to research schools because of the vast oportunities that larger schools have to offer. Maybe high quality research brings in high quality staff and high quality students. There are tiny LACs that will offer almost 1 to 1 student faculty ratio and gradaute nearly 100% of their students, but will you get more out of that experience or the experience of spending four years at Harvard, Stanford or MIT? Who knows, but the people that are being asked to judge certainly don't think so. Saying that they give high marks to schools just because they do alot of research is really taking a short sided view. They do alot of research, yes, but they do alot of other things as well, things that Mrs. Graham doesn't feel the need to comment on.</p>