<p><<<Also:
"Well then, a 5% admissions rate certainly trumps a 28% rate. It is unlikely that the fellow who was accepted into BC would have been accepted to UF."</p>
<p>This is an uninformed statement.<<<</p>
<p>I would agree Reddune. beefs originally made the argument that BC was superior to UF because it had a more selective admissions rate - 48% to 28%. I was then making the argument that its 5% out of state admission rate made the school a real reach for him, whereas he was accepted to BC - thus nulling his argument that admissions rate was a judge of a superior school. Btw, I also agree that UF will be an elite public school in the future due to its increasing selectivity. However, St Johns IS an elite school now because of the quality of the students who self-select it, although their mid-level SAT scores are just ho-hum. IMO, another reason why they must be doing something very right there to be producing as many PhDs as they are.</p>
<p>Reddune, I have nothing against BC. It was beef's beef with UF being such an inferior school and incomparable to BC measured by it's lower selectivity rating that I was objecting to. I brought in St John's as an example of a school with a very high admissions rate which offered a superior education as measured by PhD productivity ratings - in fact higher than BC - which is where you came in.</p>
<p>First of all, being realistic does not equate to "having beef" with a school. Please don't try to call me out on an anonymous college forum. Secondly, St.John's has absolutely nothing to do with the discussion at hand and even if it did, your argument is invalid. If you'd really like to compare UF and BC's grad school placement, then look for those numbers, not the success of a random college.</p>
<p>Superior is subjective, you can take any stats and turn them on their head- you have amazing school, ie St Johns that turns out PhDs, you have a school like BC, that may turn out people that are service minded, you may have a school that works with people who have LDs, who blossom, you may have school that sends out officers, or a school that produces Vets, or a school that makes a lot of teachers...</p>
<p>I find this labeling useless- this idea of prestige pointless- wonder how many of those bankers that have trashed our mortgage system came from "superior" schools?</p>
<p>"selectivity" just means that more people are applying, so fewer are selected...nothing more...</p>
<p>elite, selective, prestigious, all words that have no meaning</p>
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<p>"If you wanted to go to grad school in any of the areas I've listed above, St John's would be a pretty good bet - certainly much better than BC."
This is uninformed statement at its worst. First, what make you assumed BC student who want pursue PhD are any worse off than a student from St.John's. Where's the evidence for this? <<<</p>
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<p>This actually reminds me of another active thread right now about which high schools have the highest HYP admissions. I imagine the grad schools select from schools where they know they have gotten selective PhD candidates in the past. Since PhDs have a high drop-out rate and are expensive to produce, they are very concerned about investing in students who don't complete them, so it would figure that they would return to those schools with the most dedicated student population who have the ability to see the program out.</p>
<p>"UF being such an inferior school and incomparable to BC"</p>
<p>I agree with MattsMomFL that this claim is BS. UF is wonderful school. Anyone who can't see that UF will be a force to be worried by many current public juggernauts (UVA, UCs, and etc) really does not know UF. Prestige is 70% myth, 28% subjective, 2% reality. BC might have the leg on the "prestige" according to the laymen, but its and UF's education are comparable. Frankly, you CAN'T eat prestige. I'll take a solid education from UF over gentleman C's at Harvard. The vast majority of us go to school to be educated, not to smell Nobel Laureates' breath (which is rich with the aroma of very expensive tobacco--I have smelled three).</p>
<p>P.S.
Can we stop this BC vs. UF vs. St.John vs. Prestige mindless war already?</p>
<p>beefs: >>>Secondly, St.John's has absolutely nothing to do with the discussion at hand and even if it did, your argument is invalid. If you'd really like to compare UF and BC's grad school placement, then look for those numbers, not the success of a random college.<<<<</p>
<p>I wasn't arguing BC vs UF here, I was arguing your attempt to use admission rates to measure the "superior" school, thus the introduction of St Johns into the discussion which has a higher admissions rate than UF and BC put together. I have no idea if BC or UF is the better school, I just know that your measure of which is is flawed.</p>
<p>tokenadult: Thanks for supplying that list...it's very interesting, but I'd never seen it. I love the theory, but after looking closely, it leaves me just as puzzled as USNews' lists. Being very familiar with multiple schools on Washington Monthly's list, I really have trouble rationalizing their placement, even after reading through all of the explanatory literature. I see the numbers and I see how the schools fall where they do, but I also see that their placement (relative to one another) fails to reflect the authors' stated goals. </p>
<p>If it's not one thing, it's another. Washington Monthly is correct in stating that some sort of school ranking is necessary, but a few of the anti-USNews schools are also correct in claiming that this just isn't something that can be reduced to a single set of stats. </p>
<p>What I like about Washington Monthly's list aren't the overall rankings, but the breakdowns by school: % Pell grants, ROTC ranking, etc. Interesting to see. I also really enjoyed some of the non-list articles, particularly those pertaining to community colleges.</p>
<p>If the Washington Monthly page hasn't already been given its own thread, I recommend starting one (although it could get messy). I imagine there'd be some...colorful...debate...;)</p>
<p>krazykool - Read the explanations. This ranking isn't trying to measure the same things as USNews, and it's quite honest about that.</p>
<p>(One of my grudges against USNews is that it's often taken as the Holy Grail of rankings, so that you do get someone who laughs at the idea of Princeton being below Santa Cruz, or Texas being at the top, when it's unlikely that that person has the actual experience to know one way or the other. Obviously, these examples are on the more extreme end of things, and I realize that, but plenty of students will spend whole threads debating the rankings of a hand-full of excellent schools, when very few have experienced more than a tour or a friend's anecdotes from each school. It's partly for this reason that I really like seeing a wide variety of rankings, even when I don't agree with all of them. Shakes things up a little.)</p>
<p>How does WUSTL know where else students are applying -- do they figure it out from the SAT score report? And, by the way, I know a girl at Yale who was rejected at WUSTL.</p>
<p>Obviously; if they are top 0.1% of their class; near perfect GPA; extraordinary EC/awards, etc...WashU does tend to waitlist those kids. (And I think I read somewhere on CC that college who receive your report will get info on all the other colleges that you sent report to; so that thread advocated sending multiple requests, lol, not sure about this info)</p>
<p>Oh, uh, wow... I didn't mean to start this huge debate. The boy in question was incredibly bright and definitely deserved to get into UF too; they took many kids who should've been destined for an inferior school, perhaps UNF or UCF. </p>
<p>Also, a friend of mine got waitlisted by GW and accepted to Tufts. If you dare argue that GW>Tufts, I may cry.</p>
<p>Do You Know Anyone Rejected At A Average School Only 2 Get Into A Far Superior School</p>
<p>What does superior mean? According to dictionary.com it means:
higher in station, rank, degree, importance</p>
<p>So the question was accurately stated. Whether you agree with a school being superior or not is irrelevant, we are referring to schools higher ranked period. This is not a post that is asking if you think a superior school is worth its salt, its simply asking if you know someone rejected at a lower ranked school and accepted at a far higher ranked/superior school. Quite simple.</p>