<p>This is a VERY OBTUSE list.</p>
<p>In creating these rankings, Forbes stated they used the following:</p>
<p>"Our measures begin with student evaluations posted on Ratemyprofessors.com, a nine-year-old site with 6.8 million student-generated evaluations. We look at college graduation rates (as does U.S. News). We also calculate the percent of students winning awards like Rhodes Scholarships and undergraduate Fulbright travel grants. For vocational success we turn to Who's Who in America. Though imperfect, it is the only comprehensive listing of professional achievement that includes undergraduate affiliations. (Our complete listing of more than 200 schools can be viewed at Forbes.com.)"</p>
<p>A couple of the blog posts accompanying the article point out the obvious flaws in the reliability of these rankings: 1) "While interesting, this is another subjective set of criteria. How successful a student is once he/she graduates isn't necessarily measured by their inculsion in Who's Who in America or how they rate their professors on the web. When those become standards, we indeed have become a shallow society," and 2) "I signed myself up as a professor at Stanford (I'm not) on ratemyprofessors.com. They don't do any fact checking. If this is the cornerstone for Forbes.com's rankings, they should be concerned."</p>
<p>bet you'd be singin a different tune if WashU had cracke the top ten instead of being placed all the way at 31. lol, jk.</p>
<p>^ I agree... and I'm not jk lol</p>
<p>Who cares about the rankings? If you're getting a good education and having a good time, that's what matters. In most careers, the college you went to soon becomes irrelevant, and is relegated to the bottom of your resume. People need to stop being so concerned about "prestige" and the like.</p>
<p>How could anyone take this ranking list seriously?</p>
<pre><code>Southern Methodist ranks higher than Cornell, Duke, MIT, and JHU?????
Samford University ranks higher than Vanderbilt, Michigan, UCLA (and WashU)???
Great shorthand response: Garbage In, Garbage Out. This is garbage with a capital G.
</code></pre>
<p>The criteria used by Forbes appears to be at least as meaningful as the criteria used by U.S. News. It is clear that rankings are only given credence by people when they like the the results. Its kind of amusing reading a claim that resorting to Ratemyprofessors.com would not be a legitimate factor to consider. In effect you are contending that self reported stats provided by the schools that are being rated are more credible than the opinions of the students who actually go to the schools under review.</p>
<p>To all of you who think these are valid rankings....</p>
<p>I will sign on when you find me someone who turned down Cal Berkeley (#28 here, #21 US News) for Samford (#27 here, #118 US News).</p>
<p>And while you are at it, find someone who turned down MIT for SMU. </p>
<p>Please.</p>
<p>Rate my Professor? You have got to be kidding... My faculty friends post goofy things back and forth as a way of teasing. Kids post things when they are angry at a given faculty member and will post again and again... I'm disappointed Forbes would use a random post site like this.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The criteria used by Forbes appears to be at least as meaningful as the criteria used by US News...
[/quote]
</p>
<p>At least as meaningful? In the Bizarro World perhaps. </p>
<p>Rate my professor and Who's Who are totally unreliable sources to base an such a ranking system on and the proof lies in the lies in the aforementioned results. Need I repeat....SMU over MIT ???!!! SMU over Cornell???!!! SMU over JHU???!!!</p>
<p>USNews, for all the controversy, bases its national rankings for the most part on quantifiable measures of things that affect the quality of education. Faculty-student class ratios. Resources available to keep faculty happy. Endowment or financial resources that can be spent on academic or QOL enhancements. The quality of the student body irt academic achievement. The percentage of freshman that want to return and the graduation rate of students. And Peer Assessment, perhaps the most controversial because of its subjectivity but at least a survey that makes sense, which accounts for one fourth of the total score. </p>
<p>The US News ranking can be faulted for trying to do the impossible --- delineate minute differences between peer institutions --- but its system has been refined and improved for the last 20 years or so and though not perfect, is reasonably reliable and defensible. The Forbes ranking is neither. GIGO.</p>
<p>it's ridiculous to call a list flawed (not that this one isn't) because "no one would pick school A over school B," all that means is that a school is more popular or is held in higher regard, not that they actually do a better job of preparing you for life. Also, while rate my professor is not a reliable source, there is something to the idea that a school where students are angered enough to repeatedly post negative reviews of faculty members may not be a school i want to go to.
(and nesh1080, yeah, i just didnt want to start anything or make my post seem too harsh, but it's probably true)</p>
<p>i think you need to look at the two lists in tandem. the USNews list is entirely numbers based and has no regard for the actual learning environment at a school. Forbes on the other hand has tried to get an idea of some of the intangible qualities of a school, like the success of graduates, but unfortunately its tough to get reliable evidence for intangible qualities.</p>
<p>Since Forbes is into hearsay for data (ratemyprofessor), I wonder why they didn't include this one? students review. All kinds of good stuff on this site. This also is full of student rants and presents another way of looking at schools. Some of the schools of the Forbes list really get bashed here.</p>
<p>Again, survey data is very unreliable. Very much affected by the sample population.The majority of the faculty at my school (myself included) have never been listed on rate my professor.</p>
<p>Its true that US News relies on quantifiable measures, but the numbers they use are provided by the schools themselves. No need to go again into the criticisms of Wash U's manipulation of numbers. Whether you agree with these criticisms or not, it is something that schools have the ability to do. It would be much harder to manipulate and as Kmatimber2 notes in a way more meaningful to look at what students independently post on the internet about the learning experience at their respective schools.
As to those who criticize Forbes ranking of certain schools, keep in mind the criticism of US News when it rates Wash U. over Brown, NU, UVA, Georgetown etc.</p>
<p>WashU, Brown, and NU are within one point of each other in the overall score in the USWR system. Not enough difference to get worked up about, except of course on CC. And UVA and Georgetown are at 74 overall, so it's not shocking that Washu would rank higher.</p>
<p>Don't think students choosing UVA and Georgetown over Wash U. would agree with you. Instead as with fans of Wash U. that don't like where Forbes ranked it, they would take issue with the reliability of the methodology used in creating the rankings.</p>
<p>If you're so confident that the Forbes ranking is defensible, rollins, why don't you post this same link in the Duke forum or in the MIT forum and ask for reactions. See if you can defend its reliability to people in those forums, with Duke and MIT out of the top 10 and ranked behind SMU. Good luck.</p>
<p>I wouldn't be championing Forbes ranking system even if Washu had been placed in a shiny top 10 or top 15 spot because it's obvious from the minute you get to SMU and Samford that the whole thing is bogus. Even fans of colleges that placed well were commenting on other threads that Rate My Professors and Who's Who are downright silly as sources for information to rank universities. This ranking has been posted numerous times on various other forums and it's been blasted left and right. </p>
<p>An earlier poster on this thread commented that USNWR ranking categories have nothing to do with quality of experience in the classroom, which is just wrong. Faculty resources --- salary, benefits, class-size ratios --- affect the classroom experience. Financial resources, endowment, the money available to build new buildings and expand programs have an impact. Student selectivity --- the SAT/ACT levels and percentage of top GPA earners who make up the student body --- has an effect on the quality of the classroom experience. </p>
<p>Faculty Resources Rank:
Washu 7
Georgetown 38
UVA 36</p>
<p>Selectivity rank:
WashU: 6
Georgetown: 19
UVA: 26</p>
<p>Financial Resources rank:
WashU: 4
Georgetown: 35
UVA: 57</p>
<p>Those are areas that affect students and their college experience. What does Forbes have? A survey tally of Rate My Professor? What a joke.</p>
<p>"An earlier poster on this thread commented that USNWR ranking categories have nothing to do with quality of experience in the classroom, which is just wrong. Faculty resources --- salary, benefits, class-size ratios --- affect the classroom experience. Financial resources, endowment, the money available to build new buildings and expand programs have an impact. Student selectivity --- the SAT/ACT levels and percentage of top GPA earners who make up the student body --- has an effect on the quality of the classroom experience."</p>
<p>U.S. News may rely on self-reported statistics, but blind reliance on those statistics isn't necessarily more accurate or reliable than other criteria.
Sure faculty resources, financial resources and student selectivity have some affect on the classroom experience, but you can't be serious that the opinions of students concerning the quality of their teachers is not a valid indicator of the classroom experience provided by a particular school. Now I think you are the one who is joking.</p>
<p>Why go to other forums. Even other posters on the Wash U. forum saw some merit to the Forbes rankings. </p>
<p>One of those posters had it right in suggesting that Forbes should be used in tandem with the U.S. News rankings. Despite all the criticism of the U.S. News list by knowledgeable sources you use some of the criteria that they rely on to justify your rejection of the Forbes list. I don't see why you put total trust in the one set of rankings while completely discounting another. It is hard to believe that you aren't affected by Forbes ranking Wash U. 31st. And you are right I am sure that there are people in the Duke and MIT forums who upon seeing that their schools rankings are lower on the Forbes list would also reject the Forbes list out of hand.</p>