<p>Is there a publication that lists colleges by the number of endowed professorships? Are they factored into the rankings? Certainly they are indicative of a school's wealth and, presumably, of its academic stature and/or aspirations.</p>
<p>No, each school has different criteria.</p>
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<p>Not really. At some schools, endowed chairs are a dime a dozen and a high percentage of the senior faculty get them; at other schools it’s a rare honor reserved for the most distinguished faculty. You can’t assume that the school with more endowed chairs is wealthier; some “endowed” chairs are endowed with a great deal of money, and some with very little money, and that’s true across institutions and even within institutions. In many cases it’s just a fundraising gimmick: think of it as selling the naming rights to a particular professorship. Some schools will sell those naming rights cheap and try to make up for it in volume; others hold out for larger sums, recognizing that they’ll have fewer donors in this category but they can set a price point that will push some moderately large donors to give more than they otherwise would. But they’ll often try to get the really big donors to pop for buildings (with naming rights, of course), because buildings are generally more expensive than endowed chairs. Or, some schools will emphasize unrestricted gifts to endowment, which generally speaking are more valuable to the institution than restricted gifts like endowed chairs or endowed scholarships.</p>