Boston University has consistently been ranked in the Top 50 universities by the U.S. News and World Report. This year it ranked number 37. However, this year’s acceptance rate was 18% and the incoming class had an average ACT of 33. The stats are steadily increasing, and BU already has a pretty good reputation among employers and the general public.
Do you think that BU could realistically become a t25 or t20 school in the next few years?
No. Remember the #37 (actually #42 for 2018) you cite from USNews does not factor in the LACs and military academies. If you want to see the “real” ranking I would use Forbes best colleges list that has BU at #78. That’s a lot of ground to make up to get to Top 20. Which of the current elite colleges is BU going to replace?
Among the most popular university ranking systems (USNews, WSJ/Times, Forbes, QS and ARWU), BU is ranked #29 the highest by QS and #78 the lowest by Forbes. USNews, WSJ(including LACs) and ARWU place BU between 30-50.
I would say if BU could get into top30 it would be a major step up in terms of prestige. It is extremely difficult to get into t20 for schools with more than 16k undergraduates.
Boston University is a great school with an awesome reputation (particularly internationally). The admissions stats quoted are for the admitted students, not enrolled students. BU will only get 1 out of 4 or 5 of the kids that they admit, so you’ll want to pay attention to the enrolled student stats when those come out.
Edit: to put it into larger context. The admissions stats for enrolled students last year was a 31 ACT and SAT scores were about 30-40 points lower than the admitted student scores. Enrolled student stats are what gets used by the various rankings.
BU also has been in the process of shrinking their freshman class by 100 students each semester. 4 years ago their freshman class target was 3,500 students where it had been for years - it is 3,100 this year and I believe the plan is to go to 3,000 next year and the have that be the new norm. That shrinking of class size is at least part of the decline in acceptance rate.
@kirin94 gave good advice. Who are the schools that you think BU would pass to get into the top 20? Top 30? A lot of those schools have been there for a very long time and you would need to make the case that BU is improving faster than all of them (not to mention other up and coming schools ranked around BU like Tulane and Northeastern)
BU has a LOT of ground to make up to maybe even crack top 30. They play with admissions rates/class size to make it look more competitive. BU’s c/o 2022 has a 22% acceptance rate, but look at BC, they have a 27% acceptance rate but the quality of students accepted are better. BU ACT avg is 31, BC is 33. BC has a much better reputation as the better school in Boston, with higher starting salary, retention rate, graduating rate, etc. I know alot of students that transferred from BU to BC. Acceptance rate isn’t everything, and US news/world is lowering the value of acceptance rate when determining rankings
Always beware of first time posters. This thread is certainly not a BC vs BU thread and noone mentioned BC ahead of your post. If you want to make the argument that BC (ranked 38th) is an admissions peer so BU is likely ranked in the correct spot, that would probably be a fine argument. Also acceptance rate has already been taken out of USNWR rankings.
@beachandsnow You are using admitted stats for BC, but enrolled stats for BU. That is not an apples to apples comparison. For the class of 2022 BC had an average SAT of 1392 and an ACT of 32. BU’s average SAT was 1421 (so 30 points higher than BC’s) and an ACT of 31.
Source: https://www.bc.edu/bc-web/bcnews/campus-community/students/class-of-2022.html
http://www.bu.edu/articles/2018/class-of-2022-by-the-numbers/
It really depends on what you mean by “elite.” By any objective measure, it already is one of the best universities in the world. The differences between students of the top 50 or even top 100 Schools (from any of the ranking providers) are minimal among the academically oriented. Each of the schools offer an outstanding education if the student wants it. The top 50 schools have spaces for about 5% of US applicants. Less if you factor in foreign applications and legacy admittance. That is elite considwring 2.2 million college students will enroll in the US this fall.
If by Elite you mean Ivy League, and their ilk, that is a different question. BU is definately drawing a more competitive student than it has historically, and many if them are competitive with any student anywhere. But so are many of the top schools. The Common App and the Coalition App seem to be allowing high quality students that would have previously only looked in-state or regionally to look at the better universities nationally.
BU certainly has aspirations of being a peer of Harvard, Yale, etc. However, there a few key differences. The first is endowment. Harvard’s endowment is ten times that of BU"s endowmwnt, with 2/3rds the students. Brown has 1/3 the students of BU, but a 30% larger endowment.
The second item are the Alumni of these premier schools. As an example Harvard has multiple US Presidents, BU doesn’t. Whether the endowment begets prestigious alumni or vice verse, the top schools have both. Many in academia will cringe, but networks of prestigious alumni raise the profile of a school and rais elots of money.
Boston University and any student who attends BU should think of it as an elite education. But to trully compete with the Ivies, Stanford, Duke, etc., they will need to double ot triple the endowment and even then it will take decades.