<p>I think the Ivy League schools, in offering the best possible education for undergraduates, slipped a long time ago.</p>
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<p>This ain’t the only thread on the topic. The earth-shaking news that Caltech is very good at research shot around around CC like a rocket:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/harvard-university/1221260-caltech-dethrone-harvard-top-university-world.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/harvard-university/1221260-caltech-dethrone-harvard-top-university-world.html</a>
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1221102-top-universities-north-america-2011-2012-a.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1221102-top-universities-north-america-2011-2012-a.html</a>
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-admissions/1221120-times-higher-education-world-university-rankings-2011-2012-a.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-admissions/1221120-times-higher-education-world-university-rankings-2011-2012-a.html</a></p>
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<p>Toughyear said as much in post #116. Which school(s) do you think (s)he despises?</p>
<p>^what did I say? frankly i do not like some establishment schools such as those that you are trying so hard to defend, whatever that school is. Such an absurd notion, is that if and when a school is perched at top all is well for you. can’t wait to see several other schools rise above that arrogant one.</p>
<p>HYPS-Wharton is too big to fail.</p>
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<p>Well I did, and I was piled on for saying it. Who are these rankings for, anyway?</p>
<p>Caltech is completely irrelevant for the vast majority of college-bound students. Caltech has virtually no non-STEM majors and only 900 students. It belongs with the RPI, Rose-Hulman et al. niche schools, not the Ivies, Duke and UCLA.</p>
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<p>Do you like fables? Here’s one for you:</p>
<p>“The fox who longed for grapes, beholds with pain
The tempting clusters were too high to gain;
Grieved in his heart he forced a careless smile,
And cried ,Theyre sharp and hardly worth my while.”</p>
<p>In fact, rather than being so resentful and full of vitriol, you should be thrilled about your family’s rejections. After all, how much fun would it have been to have to live through years of supporting an institution you despise so much. </p>
<p>As always, the “system” seems to have worked quite well.</p>
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<p>I’m not defending any school so much as I’m pointing out the folly of thinking that this THES survey actually measures which university is the “Best.”</p>
<p>You may be surprised, but I’m not convinced that Harvard is the “best” university either. Certainly being ranked No. 1 by USNews is not compelling evidence for it. The reason why is that the idea of a university is so broad and approaches to its implementation so varied that even defining the concept of “best university” with any rigor and measuring that with any accuracy is a fool’s errand.</p>
<p>I’ve long said that pretty much any school can be made to win these rankings if you choose and weight the ranking factors properly. Heck, even my old alma mater, UC Davis, would come out at or near the top if you put 60% of the weight on say the strength of Enology programs. And this THES ranking puts 60% of the ranking on research. And Caltech is an excellent but tiny school that puts huge emphasis on research. Always has and always will. Good for Caltech. I admire the school immensely. But why is its winning a research contest news?</p>
<p>Look, if Caltech boosters (or Harvard haters) want to delude themselves into being thrilled that this ranking somehow proves that Caltech really is the best university, there’s no way I can stop them. I’m giving up trying to shatter their illusions. Paraphrasing Warhol: Every college gets to be ranked No. 1 for 15 minutes. This is Caltech’s 15 minutes.</p>
<p>Bay, with all due respect to RPI and Rose-Hulman, those two institutions are not in a league with Caltech. It is a different sort of place. I think that Olin might wind up comparable in some regards to Caltech, although Olin’s focus is pretty narrowly on engineering, so it is even more specialized; also Olin is quite new, so it’s difficult to be sure how it will develop.</p>
<p>Caltech is not the right place for every extraordinarily bright prospective STEM major. But it is a truly excellent place for some of them.</p>
<p>I’m not claiming that Caltech is the “best” university. Earlier I posted a link to the Times web site, where it’s possible to download a free iPhone app to pick any weighting of the factors included in the survey, that you choose. I think Harvard comes out ahead of Caltech in physical sciences, for that matter (not totally sure I agree with that, but I think that’s what the Times says).</p>
<p>The only ranking that makes any real sense is an individual student’s ranking of the universities, based on the specific qualities of interest to that student. And even then, there is a problem of incomplete information. I’d advise anyone to go for “excellent for me,” as opposed to “best,” which you may not actually be able to identify, anyway.</p>
<p>Whether RPI and R-H are in the same league as Caltech isn’t the point. It is the very specialized, niche nature of the school.</p>
<p>Also, coureur, I found “A weasel’s nose is not to be trifled with [citation needed],” in the Wikipedia entry that you provided. Is this for real, or is it a Colbert editing joke?</p>
<p>^^I think it’s real. There really is such an animal as the African Weasel. I haven’t personally seen one but judging by the pictures I’d say it looks a lot like a skinny skunk.</p>
<p>[African</a> Weasel | Mustela nivalis | Southern Africa…](<a href=“http://www.krugerpark.co.za/africa_african_weasel.html]African”>African Weasel - Poecilogale Albinucha)</p>
<p>“Caltech is completely irrelevant for the vast majority of college-bound students.”
And HYPSM and the other Ivys ARE ?? Tell me how they are “relevant” or even more relevant for the vast majority of college bound students since the vast majority have no chance of acceptance at those colleges either…</p>
<p>and Bay, how many Nobel prize winners are at Olin? RPI? Rose-Hulman?</p>
<p>It’s not where they’ll get the best educations, either. (Well, I can’t speak about Caltech…)</p>
<p>Guys, would you think it weird if Juilliard topped the list? Or the School of the Art Institute of Chicago? Of course you would. Because those schools are narrow in scope. Well, so is Caltech. That’s not a knock on the school at all. Why can’t you see that?</p>
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<p>By your way of thinking, ALL of the top universities are thus irrelevant.</p>
<p>I did not say that CalTech was irrelevant because the chance of admission was so low. I mentioned that it had virtually no non-STEM majors and had only 900 students. Those two attributes alone (along with others that are more controversial) are enough to make the college irrelevant to the vast majority of college-bound high schoolers. You cannot say the same about the Ivies, Duke, UCLA or any of the other top universities.</p>
<p>Adding: CalTech had about 4,800 applicants and a 35% yield for 2010-11.</p>
<p>and a paltry 32 nobel laureates compared to Harvard’s 46 or Chicago’s 86 but then they are a niche school with only 250 students each year.</p>
<p>[List</a> of Nobel laureates by university affiliation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nobel_laureates_by_university_affiliation]List”>List of Nobel laureates by university affiliation - Wikipedia)</p>
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Right. What does the yield have anything to do with the quality and rank? Yield in this case is clearly a ‘fit’ issue. Student, enrolling in a school or program in which one finds best fit, and then the measurement should start for the rankings metric. This ‘selectivity’ craze, drawing indiscriminate number of applicants, most of them set aside without a few minutes of reading (despite what lies they may tell, that they read everything the applicant submit – really?), so they can have 6.66% of acceptance rate rather than 9.99%, this all nonsense process is degrading the entire higher education. The practices by this group of universities that are at the very top of all universities in the country. If you think about it, it is noble and ideal which all universities should pursue as their ideal process, that you do your best in evaluating and judging the applicant’s chances of success at your institution once he or she chooses to matriculate at your college, and let the applicant decide where to matriculate based on one’s interest and career goal, you do not reduce a student’s education that can potentially affect his or her entire future to your crazy numbers game of Admission Rate and YIELD. HYPS, they are a pure joke, if you ask me.
BTW, Bay, this is not a post aimed at you, but just expressing my dissatisfaction with the whole admission process and number craze that these so-called elite universities dragging themselves down into. Just so to show H beat P by 0.001% point in rate, blah blah blah. These schools should introduce a better quality BUSINESS ETHICS courses and make al future IB professionals take multiple of them and require many term papers on them. Then our financial system will be less plagued with corrupt unethical leaders and professionals, who are making $$ at all cost in whatever way possible.</p>
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Now, don’t insult the nation’s vast number of STEM majors. So, any other disciplines are completely relevant to your ‘vast majority’, but not the ‘Engineering, Sciences, Economics’ ?? You should be joking. For those who eventually major in STEM discipline, those kids who major in STEM at UCLA, Duke, Harvard, NC State, Georgia Tech, Princeton, etc., or someone to major in Economics at MIT or Yale, the school is perfectly relevant. I am frankly ashamed of your statement, ‘irrelevant’ ? What a joke.</p>
<p>What were they thinking to include CaiTech in the survey at all? They are not a university.:)</p>
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<p>Likewise, for those who major in music at Northwestern or Oberlin, Juilliard is perfectly relevant. So how come Juilliard doesn’t belong on this list?</p>
<p>Only offering STEM = well-rounded.
Only offering the arts = niche and specialty.</p>
<p>What’s wrong with this picture? </p>
<p>Hypocrites.</p>