<p>Because of the inclusion of salary in their metric there is a systematic bias against midwestern and southern schools where salaries are lower in concert with the lower cost-of-living to be found in these regions. I suspect many Stanford and Berkeley grads move on to Silicon Valley jobs with relatively high starting salaries, hence their prominence in the rankings.</p>
<p>Additionally, although the metric considers Ph.D. production, it does not include attainment of other graduate and professional degrees.</p>
<p>I’m not necessarily endorsing Forbes’ ranking, but I certainly don’t find it shocking. US News has Davidson ranked as the #12 LAC and Washington & Lee as the #14 LAC, with Wash U as the #14 “national university” and Tulane the #51 “national university.” So at least with respect to Tulane’s position relative to Davidson and Washington & Lee, the two rankings are pretty consistent. Also note that Davidson and Washington & Lee are more selective than Tulane (middle 50% SAT CR+M is 1270-1450 at Davidson, 1310-1480 at Washington & Lee, and 1240-1410 at Tulane). </p>
<p>Wash U’s ranking relative to Davidson and Washington & Lee is more debatable, but not wildly inconsistent with the US News rankings. The only reason to find the relative rankings of these schools “really off” is if you think research universities are just inherently “better” than LACs, an assumption some people make, but it’s certainly debatable and not universally shared.</p>
<p>I hope I didn’t offend anyone. I’m not saying Davidson and Washington & Lee aren’t good schools, I am just saying the underlying metrics are flawed. Regarding SATs, your comparison justifies these schools possessing slightly higher rankings than Tulane, not a lot higher. Those numbers also show Wash U is grossly under ranked here.</p>
<p>i don’t know what your point is, Circuitrider. If anything, I believe that you are making my point. The original plan for Cooper Union included a “free education”, as pointed out in the Wikipedia site that you referred to. However, this fundamental stance has changed because of financial mismanagement, and now both graduate and undergraduate students have to pay tuition. I would like to refer you to the following article:</p>
<p>Cooper Union is an excellent college. My only point is that it does not deserve a top rating for financial management, considering what has occurred this year.</p>
<p>It’s not clear that financial management is what’s being measured so much as the overall survivability of the institution. You can afford a multitude of wrong-headed investment decisions when the bottom line is that you own the land beneath the Chrysler Building and enrolled only 900 undergraduates.</p>
That’s your opinion. If you actually knew anything about where I’m going, you’d know I was going to my dream school and into one of the best programs for what I want to do.</p>
<p>In all honesty, I don’t find college rankings say much about colleges. I just like that on them we’re higher than our biggest rival.</p>
<p>RMP is really the big factor here. Many of the top colleges were really hurt because of it…U’Chicago ranked in the 200s for it, if I recall. </p>
<p>It’s good that they don’t use absolute averages and do take into account the rigor vs ranking bias (ie. some give teachers worse scores because the class is harder), but it’s a questionable method nonetheless.</p>
<p>Oh, Serenity, that’s not what I meant at all. Sorry! I am sure wherever you are going is far superior to Liberty. I meant that you should have higher standards for the competition.</p>
<p>I cant believe they put UNC Chapel Hill 38th, while Wake Forest is 60th!!! Wake Forest is definitely the better school and deserves to be in the top 30. UNC Chapel Hill also deserves a spot in the top 30, but not better than Wake Forest. And Harvard 8th? No way, Harvard, Yale, MIT, and Stanford all deserve to be in the top 5. Also Duke as number 14? Heck no, Duke University is definitely in the top 10. This ranking is garbage. US News is better.</p>
<p>Liberty is 2 hours from my school and our biggest rival. The schools enjoy making fun of each other because they’re pretty opposite. I mean, Liberty is a conservative Christian private while my school is a public school with a liberal streak. And for men’s basketball, neither team is incredible but hey, we beat Liberty this year.</p>
<p>the top 20 are virtually exchangeable
they offer the same education, cost around the same, enroll the same caliber of admitted student, represent the schools that produce the most phds and have students winning competitive fellowships, etc.</p>
<p>if your qualms are with the ranking, just because a few schools in the top 20 did worse than others is not a great argument for why you think it’s a garbage rank</p>
<p>Especially for undergraduate students and me, I really don’t care about the Ph.D rates (I go to a school with only 2 Ph. D. programs anyways), or what the students themselves achieve–graduation/retention rates, incoming stats, competition, etc… I just know that I’m able to abuse the heck out of AP credit, exit debt-free due to it being cheap, get good professors / small class sizes, and take an engineering program that’s basically a guaranteed high-paying job.</p>
<p>It’s in the hands of the attendee to make the best out of a school I suppose!</p>
<p>Edit: Okay, according to ratings, only certain programs are actually good within it, so that’s a consideration. The school lacks a premed basis and other things, but what I’m getting out of it (basically one of the few things that is highlighted in the Forbes description) is great.</p>
<p>^^Let’s face it, the main difference between the Forbes poll and USNews is that the former pits the LACs in direct, head to head contests with research universities- and the bigger universities don’t like it. If you took out all the top LACs, Harvard and MIT would move three or four places up in the ranks and a lot of others would move up 20 places into the top 50.</p>
<p>Personally, I have more respect for Forbes letting the chips fall where they may than with USNews constantly keeping its thumb on the scale in order to keep HYPSM at the top.</p>
<p>I’m not too knowledgeable about rankings criteria but if PhD production is important then why shouldn’t M.D. and J.D. production be as well? At my school for example, it seems as if you have a few bio/chem majors who really want to pursue careers as scientists but a lot of the bio/chem majors who end up going to grad school ended up doing so because they bombed out of pre-med track (GPA too low or lost interest). I’m not trying to belittle a PhD which in many cases is “harder” to obtain than a professional degree but it appears to be a backup option for some…</p>