From The Education Trust-Some Interesting Comparison of the USNWR Top 30 Nat’l Unis

College Search & Selection
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<p>I recently downloaded some data from The Education Trust and did a number of comparisons on various bits of data. Here are some interesting comparisons that you might find interesting:</p>

<p>For degrees awarded by an institution, here is the % of students who received their degrees from an Arts & Sciences department: </p>

<p>A&S , College
96% , Harvard
96% , U Chicago
92% , Yale
89% , Dartmouth
88% , UCLA
80% , Brown
80% , Tufts
77% , Stanford
77% , Emory
76% , Princeton
73% , Georgetown
71% , Vanderbilt
70% , Columbia
69% , Rice
69% , U Virginia
68% , Duke
63% , Wash U
63% , Wake Forest
60% , U Michigan
59% , Caltech
58% , U Penn
58% , Northwestern
57% , U North Carolina
53% , Notre Dame
50% , Johns Hopkins
48% , USC
45% , Carnegie Mellon
43% , Cornell
39% , MIT
30% , UC Berkeley</p>

<p>Here is the % of students who received their degrees in either STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) and/or Health Sciences</p>

<p>STEM & HealthSci , College
95% , Caltech
76% , MIT
71% , UC Berkeley
56% , Johns Hopkins
48% , Carnegie Mellon
39% , Rice
38% , Columbia
36% , Duke
35% , Stanford
35% , Cornell
33% , Princeton
33% , U Michigan
32% , Wash U
28% , Vanderbilt
25% , UCLA
25% , U Virginia
25% , Northwestern
24% , Brown
23% , U Penn
23% , U North Carolina
23% , Notre Dame
22% , U Chicago
22% , Dartmouth
22% , Tufts
21% , Harvard
19% , Emory
18% , Yale
17% , Georgetown
16% , USC
13% , Wake Forest</p>

<p>Here is the % of students who earned their degree in an undergraduate business program (note that several colleges do not offer this and even some of those with lower numbers have done so on a very limited basis):</p>

<p>Business , College
28% , Notre Dame
25% , USC
20% , U Penn
20% , Wake Forest
18% , Georgetown
15% , Emory
12% , Carnegie Mellon
11% , Cornell
11% , Wash U
11% , U North Carolina
10% , U Virginia
9% , MIT
6% , U Michigan
6% , Brown
5% , UC Berkeley
4% , UCLA
3% , Johns Hopkins
1% , Rice
1% , Northwestern</p>

<p>na , Caltech
na , Columbia
na , Duke
na , Stanford
na , Princeton
na , Vanderbilt
na , U Chicago
na , Dartmouth
na , Tufts
na , Harvard
na , Yale</p>

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<p>The percentages would not add to 100%, because many science and math programs are located in an Arts & Sciences division.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
Here is the % of students who earned their degree in an undergraduate business program
...
1% , Northwestern

[/quote]
</p>

<p>? I wonder what this is referring to? BIP minors?</p>

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<p>Anyone wanting to concentrate on business or entrepreneurship as an undergraduate would have applied to BABSON in Boston...the #1 college in that area.</p>

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<p>Different people may interpret the data above differently which is why I originally posted without commentary. I was (and remain) curious to others' thoughts on the Education Trust data and how students can use it to help in their college search process. </p>

<p>My personal reading of the Education Trust data is how it might relate to some of the discussions/debates on CC on various colleges and their reputations. </p>

<ol>
<li><p>Undergraduate Business degree vs. Economics or some other degree. As the data shows, some very prominent colleges, that send meaningful numbers to Wall Street and other postgraduate positions in finance, don't have an undergraduate business school. This would seem to add credence to those arguing that, depending on the college, an undergraduate business degree, very possibly has a lot less power than some might claim.</p></li>
<li><p>Prominence of Liberal Arts degrees: I'm still thinking about this, but it was very interesting to see the huge spread of Liberal Arts degrees being awarded among these top 30 colleges from 96% at Harvard down to 30% at UC Berkeley. Also:
A. 5 of the 30 colleges had more than 88% of their graduates receiving a Liberal Arts degree;
B. 13 of the 30 colleges had more than 70% of their graduates receiving a LA degree; and
C. 24 of the 30 colleges had more than 50% of their graduates receiving a LA degree. </p></li>
</ol>

<p>What's up with the UC Berkeley numbers with only 30%? I'm guessing that this is a classification issue, but if 30% is accurate, I am surprised that this college has such a limited number of liberal arts graduates.</p>

<ol>
<li>The Perceptions of the Tech and Health Focused Schools are reinforced: Within the STEM & Healthcare measurement, the top five colleges (Caltech, MIT, UCB, JHU, CMU), all have reputations for excellence in these areas, but their numbers for Liberal Arts were 50% or fewer which places them at the lowest end of that grouping (along with Cornell and USC).</li>
</ol>

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<p>Since when is sending people to Wall Street the only measure of business education? Wall Street is hardly a model of open and diverse hiring and is the reason "old boys network is not considered a positive term. And they have done so well as of late (GS excluded) nearly putting the US into a recession as they succeeded in doing during the tech bubble.<br>
Tens of thousands of business school grads land good jobs at the largest corporations and other firms in the country. The average starting salaries are as high as the best from other majors at the same school.</p>

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<p>barrons,
I am completely on board with you in your observation and I see now the narrowness of my comment above. You're right. Sorry. Business education is about so much more than Wall Street. I will add, however that my observation is still probably accurate as the lack of a business program at those colleges without a dedicated program probably is not a major impediment to their finding good jobs in the business world (Wall Street included).</p>

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<p>hawkette:</p>

<p>Cal must be a classification issue since the undergrad campus is not a whole lot different that UCLA. Both have engineering. Cal has Haas, but UCLA does not offer an undergrad biz degree -- its 'biz-econ' program is a specialty within the econ department of A&S.</p>

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<p>bluebayou,
I just checked the CDS for UCB for last year. It looks like a classification error as you suggest. Just over 36% were in the STEM & Health Sciences categories according to Section J of the CDS which shows the awarded degrees. Engineering was the biggest at 12.2% and biological/life sciences was 10.7% and then multiple other degree types were mentioned.</p>

<p>All of the others look about right to me. What are your impressions of the data?</p>

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<p>thanks hawkette. wrt to the data, I'm rather nonplussed - perhaps bcos I'm rather dense, the data doesn't tell me anything, and, in particular, is skewed by those colleges that have large undergrad biz programs. For example, USC has a top 10 engineering program, but is low on the STEM list, perhaps, bcos 25% of undergrads are biz majors. But, moreover, does a prospective Yale theater major really care what it's STEM % is? Or, would a prospective Eng major at Stanford care much about its A&S (besides knowing it has one, and most courses will be pretty good).</p>

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<p>bluebayou,
I agree with your comment about how little the prospective engineering student cares about A&S and vice versa. That has long been part of my beef with the PA scoring which I have long suspected of favoring colleges with large technical programs. Outside of the Ivies, I think that pattern holds up pretty well. </p>

<p>Here is another interesting data point from the Education Trust that you have often talked about:</p>

<p>Pell School
39% , UCLA
35% , UC Berkeley
21% , USC
17% , Columbia
17% , Caltech
17% , Cornell
16% , MIT
15% , U North Carolina
14% , Dartmouth
14% , Stanford
14% , U Michigan
14% , Carnegie Mellon
13% , U Chicago
13% , Emory
12% , Brown
12% , Vanderbilt
11% , Yale
11% , Tufts
11% , Georgetown
11% , Rice
11% , Duke
11% , U Penn
11% , Johns Hopkins
10% , Northwestern
10% , Notre Dame
9% , Harvard
8% , Princeton
8% , U Virginia
8% , Wake Forest
7% , Wash U</p>

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<p>The interesting thing about the Pell Grant info is that USC has often been described as "rich kids' school." However, the school stands out for its proportion of Pell Grant recipients.</p>

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<p>What is also interesting is that the University of Virginia, a public university, has a lower percentage of Pell Grant recipients than any of the Ivy League schools with the exception of Princeton.</p>