Fordham vs. Villanova

Colleges and Universities A-Z Villanova University
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<p>OK folks, lets not get so serious here…the link I provided (in toungue in cheek) was to show that any list of “Top schools” can be challanged; I KNOW it only listed 3 Catholic schools, omiting some of the best…that was my point; someone’s top five may not be someone else’s top five depending on what criteria you use. </p>

<p>And say all you want about where VU would be if it were in the National category; that fact is if it was categorized as a National U, it would be in the National U and not regional. Can’t blame me for what USN&WR does…</p>

<p>I have a nephew at VU, I have a kid who almost went to VU. I have been there a few times, I have sung it’s praises to others, but in looking at ALL factors I cannnot say it is better than Fordham, Holy Cross and not better than Lehigh or Case Western. Perhaps on this forum, but not on others. Don’t have to agree with me… and I see you won’t but try telling a Lehigh or Case Western fan VU is just as good and I don’t think they would agree with you either.</p>

<p>But it is a free country</p>

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<p>Villanova is a good school. It is not quite as academically strong as Lehigh, Wake Forest, Holy Cross, Case Western (probably the strongest most under-appreciated schools around), but it is in the domain of Fordham, Lafayette, Rutgers, Penn. State, Syracuse, Dickinson, Gettysburg, GW, American, etc. It certainly does not rise to its “aspiring peers”–Georgetown, Notre Dame, or even BC.</p>

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<p>My last post on fordham / Nova comparison :</p>

<p>You can argue which school is “better” or get hung up on USNWR categories but there can be no debate which school has a stronger student body or does a better job retaining and graduating that student body along with a lower student faculty ratio ,average class size and and those are the metrics that USNWR measure Universities by. </p>

<p>SAT CR 590-680 M 620-710 Villanova , Fordham CR 570-670 M 580-670
ACT Composite 28-31 Villanova , 25-28 Fordham
Student Faculty Ratio : 11:1 Villanova , 13:1 Fordham.
Freshman Retention rate 94.5% Villanova , 87.7 % Fordham
4yr Graduation Rate 85% Villanova , 76% Fordham
6yr Graduation Rate 90% Villanova , 80% Fordham
Average High School GPA for Freshman Class Villanova 3.86 , Fordham 3.52
% of freshman in top 10% of class Villanova 64% , Fordham 42%
% of Freshman in top 25% of class Villanova 89% , Fordham 78%
Villanova has a stronger academic profile for it’s incoming freshman class and a higher rate of academic success after enrollment.</p>

<p>It’s a free country but measurable facts are hard to dispute. </p>

<p>Villanova will not be in the National Category until it confers more Doctoral degrees and it will not be in the Liberal Arts Category until in confers over 50% of it’s degrees in Liberal Arts. But it can be measured against schools in those categories by using the methodologies applied in the USNWR analysis and USNWR utilizes measurable metrics not subjective opinions in their analysis.</p>

<p>And don’t get me started with comparison to Syracuse or Rutgers. C’mon , you guys are smart , do some research and leave personal bias out.</p>

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<p>medman your ignorance never ceases to amaze me…once again people are supposed to simply “take your word for it.” You are upset that a rising number of high school seniors these days are choosing villanova, BC, and Holy cross over Georgetown( although clearly more still choose to gtown) so you go to each of these sites and knock the schools down a notch so they wont be competition to gtown. If villanova is similar to rutgers (SAT scores at nova are 235 pts higher than at rutgers) then georgetown is similar to providence college (gtown scores are 235 pts higher). </p>

<p>Villanova has higher SAT scores than Holy cross (only by five points though), Fordham, Lafayette, (about 100 pts higher than Penn. State, and Syracuse and 230 pts higher than rutgers), Dickinson, GW, and American. Its SAT scores tie Lehigh and Wake Forest and are 30 pts below case. Selectivity is similar at case, nova, wake forest, and lehigh. At case (50% admit), Nova (44%), Wake forest (40%), and lehigh( 33%). Fresh retention rates are all around 90-95% at case, nova, wake forest, and lehigh. </p>

<p>Students admitted to both villanova and lehigh ( 56% choose villanova)
Students admitted to both villanova and case (67% choose villanova)
Students admitted to both villanova and holy cross (60% choose villanova)
Students admitted to both villanova and wake forest (43% choose villanova)
[Compare</a> Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.](<a href=“Compare Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.”>Compare Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.)</p>

<p>It seems then that students choose villanova over every school you said was academically superior except wake forest. </p>

<p>medman I feel like my intelligence has dropped just by responding to your inflammatory jargon. Nova is clearly much better than many of those schools you listed and is a peer, if not academically superior, to holy cross, case, lehigh, and wake forest.</p>

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<p>Fordham is one of the oldest and highest ranked Jesuit colleges in the nation. The Jesuits have long been famous for being the intellectuals of the Church and for running the highest ranked colleges. They run 28 different universities in the US alone. I’m not that familiar with Villanova but think they are run by the Augustinians which operate just a couple schools.</p>

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<p>The Augustinians run Villanova and Merrimack College. Merrimack has an acceptance rate of 78.1 percent and an early acceptance rate of 91.5 percent.</p>

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<p>the jesuits definitely run alot of the top catholics (BC, HC, Gtown, Fordham) but that does not necessarily mean they are stronger than the other orders like Villanova’s augustinians or notre dame’s order(forgot the name). </p>

<p>also the jesuits run alot of lower tier catholic colleges that no one has heard of such as university of detroit mercy…</p>

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<p>Point of information about the US News rankings—
US News rankings are not as unbiased as you might think.</p>

<p>Student selectivity actually counts for a small 15% of the total US News ranking score.
SAT scores make up 50% of that 15% – or 7.5% of the total score.
Acceptance rate is tiny 10% of that 15% – or 1.5% of the total. </p>

<p>In fact, faculty compensation counts as much in the ranking as SAT scores (7.5%). Average salaries are published and Lehigh, Fordham, Lafayette, Penn State and Rutgers all pay their faculty more than Nova. But Nova pays more than US News peer schools, Providence and Fairfield.</p>

<p>Also, the alumni giving rate counts for 5% of the total. That number counts almost as much as SAT scores and much more than the acceptance rate.
Nova alumni giving rate is 18%,
Fairfield 14%,
Penn State 21%,<br>
Lehigh 22%,
Providence 23%,
Fordham 25%,
Lafayette 30%</p>

<p>On the other hand,<br>
22.5% of the national university ranking comes from peer assessment (opinions of college presidents, deans, etc. at other nationally ranked universities) and high school guidance counselor assessment </p>

<p>25% of the regional university ranking comes from peer assessment. High School counselors do not assess regional schools. </p>

<pre><code> The peer group in the national category includes the Ivies, Notre Dame, Duke, Berkeley, USC, Stanford etc.
</code></pre>

<p>The peer group in the Northeast regional category includes Fairfield, Providence, College of NJ, Loyola Maryland etc. </p>

<p>This peer assessment score is obviously based on opinion. So those US News rankings are not as unbiased as you might think. And, although a good chunk of the score is based on the numbers, a quarter of the score comes from peer opinion and each category (national, regional, liberal arts) has a different peer group.</p>

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<p>Nova2011: Dream as you will…VERY, VERY, VERY few people choose Villanova over Georgetown (athletes maybe, bought students maybe). You didn’t either…</p>

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<p>By the way, there are not a lot of cross-admits between Villanova and Georgetown…for obvious reasons.</p>

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<p>Does anyone have any info on reasons VN gave up its very well advertised number 7 business school ranking and is currentl- # 13? Thanks!</p>

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<p>Sorry, meant to include from vn website:</p>

<p>Bloomberg Businessweek - 2012
Best Undergraduate Business Schools </p>

<h1>13 in the nation</h1>

<p>Overall Academic Quality Rank: #2
Student Grade for Teaching Quality: A+
Student Grade for Job Placement: A+ </p>

<p>thanks</p>

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<p>^I think that a drop of six places has more to do with the economy in the philly market than it does with academic caliber. Because those ranking put a lot of weight into how many graduates from a certain business school get jobs, and what level of jobs, I am surmising that the companies that usually hire villanova grads aren’t hiring much of anybody right now.<br>
Business week also says that NYU dropped but once again I think that any significant drops must be because of job placement and the volatility of the economy right now…It just doesnt make much sense that one year there are plenty of bright students and then next year they admit a bunch of lower level students.</p>

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<p>Here is how Business Week ranks schools:
[How</a> We Ranked the Schools - Businessweek](<a href=“Bloomberg - Are you a robot?”>Bloomberg - Are you a robot?)</p>

<p>Here is a summary of how the rank is computed
a student survey counts for 30%
a recruiter survey counts for 20%
a starting salaries score counts for 10%
an MBA feeder school score counts for 10%
academic quality counts for 30%.</p>

<p>30% of the ranking is based on a student survey which can vary year to year, depending on many factors. The student survey could cause big changes in the rankings from year to year.</p>

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<p>Nova 2011</p>

<p>I was just going to forget about this thread but wanted to see how far this crazy debate has gone: As you and others feel USN&WR methodolgy is flawed; ANY data can be found to be flawed. Take for example your citation:</p>

<p>Students admitted to both villanova and lehigh ( 56% choose villanova)
Students admitted to both villanova and case (67% choose villanova)
Students admitted to both villanova and holy cross (60% choose villanova)
Students admitted to both villanova and wake forest (43% choose villanova)</p>

<p>There are so many factors as to why a student picks a school, you are blindly assuming it is purely academics. What of distance? or family legacy? or financial aid? or friends going to the same school? or location preferences? or even sports?. My kid was offered more aid for VU but just preferred another school…some will have picked VU. This information is not worth much without context: i.e. the reason why 56% chose VU over Lehigh.</p>

<p>While I have no desire to get involved with your little thing with medman, your statement “Nova is clearly much better than many of those schools you listed and is a peer, if not academically superior, to holy cross, case, lehigh, and wake forest” is just not based on anything but some SAT points. No where else other than on a Villanova forum would this statement be taken as true. I know quite a few professionals where I have worked and I can assure you people who went to the schools you refer to as academically inferior if not equal to Villanova would laugh out loud and say “What to you expect a kid from Villanova to say?” I won’t even tell you what folks from Holy Cross and Lehigh think of academics at VU…I know Nova is a fine school but I don’t see it through the magnifying glass used by others to make it look larger than it is.</p>

<p>So on these boards, among your peers, go on thinking “Nova is clearly much better than many of those schools you listed and is a peer, if not academically superior, to Holy Cross, case, lehigh, and wake forest”. Go on thinking USN&WR got it all wrong vis-a-vis your school. Go on thinking Nova does not belong with the likes of Farifield, Marist, Manhattan etc. but can go toe-to toe with Lehigh, Georgetown, Boston College etc.</p>

<p>Its a free country ;^)</p>

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<p>Since US News ranks them in different categories, it is hard to compare apples and oranges but if you look at the Forbes rankings of the best colleges Holy Cross comes in at #27 and Villanova comes in at #119. A big difference.</p>

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<p>No one takes Forbes list seriously, look at these odd rankings …</p>

<p>UPenn # 52
Vandy # 53
Wake Forest # 77
Johns Hopkins # 101
WUSTL # 113 , one spot ahead of St Johns University.
Lehigh # 124 , 91 spots behind Lafayette # 33
U Richmond # 129
NYU # 200
U of Miami # 221</p>

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<p>Just stepping in here to say that I agree that the Forbes list is ridiculous and completely out of touch with reality.</p>

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<p>Ramray</p>

<p>I never said usnews was totally unreliable. I just said their rankings do not include vu because they base their methodology on how many doctorate degrees are offered (thats why the liberal arts colleges are not on the national list.) I also never compared Villanova to Georgetown, but simply pointed out that SOME students at villanova do in fact choose it over georgetown. </p>

<p>RamRay, I have shown that villanova a) has students who score better on the SATs, and b) more students choose villanova over the other schools. Most people would consider them peer schools if villanova consistently attracts students who turn down case, holy cross, wake, and when the colleges also have similar objective data, such as SAT scores…I dont have time to post it but the high school gpa of villanova is also similar (above some and below some) to hc, case, wake etc…all are about in between 3.65-3.85</p>

<p>I have other data to support my points. Villanova also has more merit scholars than Holy Cross (for 2011, VU had 9 and HC had 0). You seem to think that holy cross grads laugh at Villanova academics. Well I know many villanova students who laugh at HC where they cant seem to attract any merit scholars. </p>

<p>When I said vu was clearly better than, I was talking about the much lower tier schools medman mentioned, purposefully, trying to incite people on this forum. He compared VU to rutgers and syracuse, to name a few. VU a) attracts alot more cross admitted students, b) has at least 150 pts higher SAT scores, and c) attracts students who have won more significant awards, such as merit scholars. My statement about those schools is in no way false. In regards to the other schools, hc, wake, lehigh, etc. Villanova has shown through cross admits, SAT scores, and award winners that it is in fact similar to HC, Lehigh , etc…You may laugh at me and say I have no basis for judgment and am just a silly “kid” who goes to nova, but I have provided alot more supporting information than you or medman…and to use your similar argument, “what do you think grads from Holy cross and lehigh are gonna say??” </p>

<p>as for fairfield and manhattan, you have no reason to believe that they are academically similar to Villanova other than simply because they offer the same number of doctorate degrees(thats why they are on the same usnwr list). You seem to think SAT scores, cross admits, gpa and awards does not show academic strength of a college but rather which list usnwr puts a college on. get a clue. </p>

<p>Last point. The funny thing is students and faculty at lehigh agree that nova is a peer school. I have many friends at lehigh who couldnt get into villanova, yet still speak strongly of it, and have many friends at nova who couldn’t get into lehigh, who still speak strongly of it.</p>

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<p>The simple reason why Holy Cross has no National Merit Scholars is because they award only need-based aid. Harvard, Yale University, and the six other schools in the Ivy League also don’t fund National Merit scholarships because they award only need-based aid.</p>