20%?
30%?
How much weight do give it?
0%
If it feels like the right fit academically, financially, and socially for the individual, then that’s why I would choose a school, not because of a USNWR ranking.
In my case, I applied only to schools that I knew would give substantial merit aid - hardly any of the top ranked schools do so to an extent where it would be economically feasible.
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Zero. Nothing. Zilch.
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20 years ago - 75%
10 years ago - 25%
5 years ago - 10%
Now - <10%
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USNWR is an arbitrary weighting of various metrics such as 20% survey asking “academics” to rate colleges on a scale of 5 = distinguished to 1 = marginal, 10% financial resources per student, 7% faculty compensation, etc. I doubt that these weightings correspond to your personal feelings about what criteria is important in selecting a college. I also doubt that they are the weightings that USNWR believes make up the best college. Instead it probably has more to do with magazine and/or website subscription sales.
I’d suggest instead focusing on the criteria that is important to you, which may include some of the criteria that is weighted as part of the USNWR ranking or may include none of the criteria. For example, your net cost after FA is likely to be important to your college decision, yet is not considered by USNWR. Instead USNWR gives a small weight to the average rate of federal loans for the full class, which is probably far less meaningful to you.
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I like any rankings which places my kids’ colleges higher than whatever other rankings I happen to be looking at. That can change at any time.
I have definitely seen less emphasis on USNWR rankings since I first came to CC in 2014.
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The only rankings that mattered in the Thumper household were the rankings our kids did for the colleges they visited and subsequently applied to.
Believe it or not, we never saw or read a USNews or knew the rankings of any of the schools our kids applied to…until long after the youngest one had matriculated.
So…0%
My kids used it as one of a handful of rankings to identify schools to go on their long list to start investigating. Once they started researching, visiting, etc., a USN ranking didn’t mean much at all.
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We started shopping for colleges by visiting a few in our area - a large public, a medium private, and a small LAC. DD really identified with the LAC so we used the USN list to find other schools. It was an easy way to identify LACs from the massive number of colleges in the country and then weed out those that were too far from home. As to whether or not the rankings came into play, decidedly not. It was just a tool to get started.
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Any schools in the Top 100 or so are good enough and I don’t care at all about the difference between #3, #35, or even #75. Fit is so much more important to me than much of the ranking criteria.
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During my daughter’s college search to compile the list to apply, I used US.News for info about school profiles including location, FA and student life and ranking was not the factor.
However, daughter is still waiting for a couple more decisions in the RD round. Perhaps, we may have to use ranking as factor for final decision then.
I wouldn’t say zero. It was a slight consideration when my DD was down to her top 2 choices — one was ranked about 50 and the other ranked around 150. When weighing the pros and cons, the school ranked around 50 won the ranking factor, but it was one of like 20 factors. To be fair, the internships and job my DD secured would likely not have happened at the one ranked around 150 because it’s a prestige focused industry. Her path therefore would have looked very different, though not necessarily worse.
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US News ratings & rankings raise awareness of schools & the schools’ characteristics such as retention rates, acceptance rates, student to faculty ratio, graduation rates, standardized test score parameters, & peer assessment scores.
US News also makes the college search easier by organizing schools into regional or national categories as well as university or LAC status.
Additionally, US News shows the top majors at each school & shares profiles of the student body.
In my opinion, it would be foolish to ignore such a thorough & reliable resource during the application process.
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Once D decided on school type/location preferences, we did look up the undergraduate rankings for her intended major.
Since I had a kid who was laser focused on a major, we spent way more time looking at career outcomes, recruiting on campus, co-op/internship opportunities, etc…
You may want to start by considering the value of statistics in general. At their best, statistics can see further than ordinary perception alone. In the case of colleges, USN may be good at recognizing schools that are widely respected for their perennially strong academics. USN may be even better, however, at recognizing ascendent and descending colleges in a form that might not otherwise be visible.
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I think those rankings are more useful at the beginning of the search than at decision time. When you are just starting to look, there are lots of schools you don’t know much about and I think the lists can help you get a feel for things and help identify options that you hadn’t thought of. Once you start learning more about the specific schools that appeal to you, the lists don’t matter.
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I ask because I recently found a college ranking that I thought was useful
Best Value:
https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/best-value
You are joking, right?
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I find this ranking amusing. The top 10 are listed below. Which college does not fit with the others?
- Harvard
- Princeton
- Gallaudet
- Yale
- MIT
- Columbia
- Stanford
- Rice
- Vanderbilt
- Dartmouth
In seriousness, a “best value” ranking is near useless if it does not consider your personal cost. For example #1 ranked Harvard is likely to be a great value among families with <$65k income for which the college has an expected $0 cost to parents. Harvard is not likely to be a great value for families with >$250k income who pay >$75k per year and likely have numerous other possible quality college choices that are very low cost after merit scholarships.
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Such “value” calculations are only meaningful (and then, marginally) for the specific situation the survey defines. Here, it is a "student who received the average level of need-based financial aid. ". Very few people are exactly average.
As described above, individual results using their algorithm will vary wildly depending on your situation.