Hello all! I am a senior currently deciding between computer engineering colleges. The three I’m deciding between are UT Austin Honors, Duke, and University of Southern California. Now obviously there’s more to a college than rankings, but I feel like i would fit in at all of these socially. I wanted to see if anyone knew why there’s such a disparity between rankings and selectivity. UT’s computer engineering program is top 7, and general engineering program is top 11. However, it is ranked #56 overall. On the other hand, Duke is in the top 10 overall and much more selective, but only 18 for engineering (doesn’t break 15 in Computer Engineering). USC is in the twenties for both. How do I go about deciding where I would find the best engineering education? Do engineering rankings matter more than overall rankings? Thanks!
Disclaimer: I know no specifics about those particular schools. A few points for you to ponder over, though:
There are thousands of colleges in the US, and you are talking about a difference of a couple of dozen between your colleges. That’s not much.
Next, it depends on what you want to do after you graduate. If you want to go to grad school, that becomes more important than where you went undergrad: look at the graduate schools you’d like to go to, and see where are the PhD students coming from.
As always, personal fit and finances may trump all of the above. Visit if you can, and try to get an appointment to talk with a professor in each of them.
First consider cost and value. Anything unaffordable is out, and debt is bad. Next you look at the engineering program first, engineering school second, and overall school third. Also look at ‘fit’ factors which might completely exclude the school - stress, weather, social aspects, safety etc. or make it particularly attractive to you.
You should look at the methodology used by the ranking service for a better idea. Some metrics are skewed by popularity (e.g. kids like SoCal weather), income after graduation (east+west coasts are higher), average costs, alumni giving etc. There are lots of anomalies too in the rankings (e.g. Michigan is ranked about #29 in USA but #19 in the world) all due to different methodologies.
Selectivity has a lot do to with perceived value. The most selective schools have low average costs (good FA), high average sticker prices, are close to population centers, and have built a name brand over hundreds of years. (Their reputation is almost always based on their graduate schools) They also usually have holistic admissions - which has the effect of increasing the number of applicants because of uncertainty in the admission process. (Schools like CalTech with a completely merit based admission process are more self-selecting). They also have high yields - the % of students who choose to attend if admitted. State schools can have completely different selectivity and yield profiles for in-state and OOS students.