<p>Law school is in my past, and I have to say that I agree with barrons on this. There is virtually no chance that a college could successfully sue U.S. News for libel based on its list and its opinions, unless it could be proven that U.S. News deliberately published false information that harmed the school. Manipulating the data in this or that way wouldn't cut it, as long as the data are accurate.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Cal and Michigan have more distinguished academic programs (i.e. business and engineering) than Rice, Duke and Dartmouth. I agree with you that PA score is somewhat influenced buy grad reputation...however, USNWR specifically ranked undergraduate departments for business and engineering categories.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>While not exactly inaccurate, should you not consider the number of schools that do NOT offer a business major to its undergraduates? Or do not offer engineering courses? </p>
<p>After all, how many of the Ivies Plus do offer bona fide business degrees at the UG level? How do we reconcile the absence of business undergraduate majors with the fact that the same schools offer the very best business degrees at the MBA level? </p>
<p>:)</p>
<p>To date MIT, Penn, and Cornell have ug business programs. Many others have a more practical track in ecnonomics that includs some finance and investment classes.</p>
<p>Dartmouth for example</p>
<p>Economics 26: The Economics of Financial Intermediaries and Markets
This course examines the nature and function of financial intermediaries (e.g., banks, mutual funds, and insurance companies) and of securities markets (e.g., the money and capital markets and the market for derivatives). It analyzes liquidity and risk management and studies the efficiency, stability, and regulation of the financial system.
Prerequisite: Economics 1.
Dist: SOC.</p>
<p>Economics 29. International Finance and Open-Economy Macroeconomics
This course covers introductory material in the area of international monetary theory and policy. It examines the behavior of international financial markets, the balance of payments and exchange rates, interactions between the balance of payments, the exchange rate and domestic economic activity and ways of organizing the international monetary system.
Prerequisite: Economics 22 or permission of the instructor.
Dist: SOC. or INT.</p>
<p>Economics 36. Theory of Finance
This course studies decision making under risk and uncertainty, capital budgeting and investment decisions, portfolio theory and the valuation of risky assets, efficiency of capital markets, option pricing, and problems of asymmetric information. Prerequisites: Economics 10, 21, and 26, or permission of the instructor.
Dist: SOC.</p>
<p>Economics 38. Urban and Land Use Economics
This course is about the location of economic activities. The central focus is on urban areas and attendant problems in public economics, but some attention is given to agricultural, natural resource, and environmental issues. Topics include housing markets, transportation, local government structure, property taxes, resource depletion, and zoning and land use controls. Economics 72 may be substituted for Economics 38 in the Economics 28-38 sequence.
Prerequisite: Economics 1.
Dist: SOC.</p>
<p>Economics 46. Topics in Money and Finance
A seminar course covering in depth such selected topics as the following: the theory of financial institutions; banking panics; the excess variability of asset prices; finance constraints and capital market imperfections; the theory of monetary policy; inflation and financial markets; debt and deficits. Will require writing a major paper.
Prerequisites: Economics 20, 22, and 36.
Dist: SOC.</p>
<p>Hunt....
"There is virtually no chance that a college could successfully sue U.S. News for libel based on its list and its opinions, unless it could be proven that U.S. News deliberately published false information that harmed the school."</p>
<p>Actually there is a 100% chance that a school CAN sue them. Maybe the probability of winning is low. However the threat of a lawsuit is scary enough.</p>
<p>You and I agree. My stipulations are the same as yours, IF US News lies AND it causes damage, a law suit is justified. US News has already admitted to making up SAT scores for a liberal arts college that refused to participate. The pattern of behavior has already been established. If that school was damaged and and had enough money, they most certanly could sue and win. If you still disagree with me, that's OK because by logic, half of the lawyers who go to must have the wrong opinion :) Besides all it takes is 1 real case, I'm not talking about EVERY college suing. Or, I could see a consortium of colleges joining in a class action suit.</p>
<p>
[quote]
To date MIT, Penn, and Cornell have ug business programs. Many others have a more practical track in ecnonomics that includs some finance and investment classes.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Indeed, Barrons! And, it is pretty hard to be recognized for a program a school does not offer. I'd say, when it comes to preparing undergraduate students for the business world, the USNews "list" out to get an I for incomplete. </p>
<ol>
<li> University of Pennsylvania (Wharton) 4.9 </li>
<li> Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (Sloan) 4.7 </li>
<li> University of CaliforniaBerkeley (Haas) * 4.5 </li>
<li> University of MichiganAnn Arbor * 4.5 </li>
<li> New York University (Stern) 4.3 </li>
<li> U. of North CarolinaChapel Hill (Kenan-Flagler) * 4.3 </li>
<li> Carnegie Mellon University (PA) 4.2 </li>
<li> University of TexasAustin (McCombs) * 4.2 </li>
<li> Univ. of Southern California (Marshall) 4.1 </li>
<li> University of Virginia (McIntire) * 4.1 </li>
<li> Indiana UniversityBloomington (Kelley) * 4.0 </li>
<li> Cornell University (NY) 3.9 </li>
<li> Emory University (Goizueta) (GA) 3.9 </li>
<li> Ohio State UniversityColumbus (Fisher) * 3.9 </li>
<li> U. of IllinoisUrbana-Champaign * 3.9 </li>
<li> Univ. of WisconsinMadison * 3.9 </li>
<li> Washington University in St. Louis (Olin) 3.9 </li>
<li> Pennsylvania State U.University Park (Smeal) * 3.8 </li>
<li> Univ. of MinnesotaTwin Cities (Carlson) * 3.8 </li>
<li> University of Notre Dame (IN) 3.8</li>
</ol>
<p>"Cal and Michigan have more distinguished academic programs (i.e. business and engineering) than Rice, Duke and Dartmouth. [...] USNWR specifically ranked undergraduate departments for business and engineering categories."</p>
<p>A lot of students on business tracks are in schools that don't have business schools: Harvard, Princeton, Dartmouth, Yale, Columbia, etc. They are not in USNWR top fifty undergrad business programs ranking because they don't have undergrad business programs. Yet, student at these schools are most sought after by NYC investment banks and top consulting firms.</p>
<p>IPBear, Cal's and Michigan's reputation in Academe, and that includes graduate school adcoms, is among the top 10 or 15 in the US...FULL STOP! And I do not believe (nor habe I ever said) that Michigan is better than Dartmouth, Duke or Rice at the undergraduate level...but then again, nor is it weaker. I always rated those schools equally. I personally don't care what the general public thinks because the general public is ignorant...so is anybody who thinks Cal and Michigan aren't not a top 10 or top 15 universities.</p>
<p>"I personally don't care what the general public thinks because the general public is ignorant"</p>
<p>Alexandre: Perhaps you think elite graduate school admissions officers and NYC IB recruiters are ignorant as well for hiring more Dartmouth and Duke undergrads than Cal and Michigan undergrads? Cal and Michigan are in the top 15 only when their graduate programs are taken into account. Cal would even make it into the top 5 in the world with its graduate programs. However, it's a different story at the undergraduate level.</p>
<p>IPBear, you obviously know very little about Michigan. </p>
<p>IB Recruiters hire as heavily at Michigan as they do at Duke or Dartmouth. Check your facts. I had offers from 4 of the top 10 IBanks 3 months before graduating from college, as did dozens of fellow LSA majors. And IBanks recruit undergrads even more heavily at the Michigan Business school. Cal is all the way on the West Coast, so they are at a geographic disadvantage.</p>
<p>And graduate school adcoms respect Cal and Michigan a great deal. I have yet to see any sign that they are less respected than any other university.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>To amplify a bit: at common law, libel (or "defamation" which covers both libel and slander) occurs if the defendant publishes statements in a fixed form that are false, defamatory, and cause actual harm to plaintiff's business or reputation, which the defendant knew or should have known to be false. There are some defenses. Truth is an absolute defense; if US News publishes true data, that's not actionable even if it harms the plaintiff. In most jurisdictions, good faith and reasonable belief in the truth of the statements is also a defense; so if US News publishes false data that it actually believes and has reason to believe are true, that's not actionable either. Most jurisdictions also recognize opinion as a defense: if the defendant publishes an opinion that cannot be proved true or false in a court of law, the publication of that opinion is not actionable; so if a plaintiff college is harmed by US News' published opinion that some other colleges are better, that's not actionable either. Finally, consent may be a defense; arguably, by submitting data to US News with knowledge that those data would be published and would form the basis for the opinion contained in the US News rankings, the colleges consented to the publication of the data and, implicitly, to the publication of the rankings based upon those data.</p>
<p>Bottom line, libel is very difficult to prove in the U.S. Absent a showing that US News knowingly, recklessly, or negligently published false statements, no plaintiff is going to be successful in a libel suit, no matter how much harm the publication does to the plaintiff's reputation. Whether such a suit rises to the legal standard of "frivolous," however, is another matter. More likely the suit would simply be dismissed.</p>
<p>
Do you have numbers for FT or SA for a recent year's class at a bulge-bracket firm to back this assertion up perhaps, out of curiosity? I definitely think that Ross is extremely close if not on par with Duke and Dartmouth for IB recruiting. I doubt the same holds true for LSA though.</p>
<p>I think UMich and Cal are legitimate top 20 schools, but I don't see how they can be top 10 or 15 because I don't see what universities they would replace.</p>
<p>i have no one single link to prove this, but based on my experience at Michigan, and my network of friends on wallstreet, Ross places better than Duke and Dartmouth for IB. LSA and Engineering don't place as well as those two schools, but better than most schools ranked in the late teens to 20s by USnews.</p>
<p>keefer, your post doesn't make sense. Are you saying that there were a lot more friends in your network from Michigan than Duke or Dartmouth and that Ross ITSELF had more cumulative than either one of these schools? I don't know how telling this is since there appears to be a lot of bias as you are/were a Michigan student; therefore, you were "more likely" to friend Michigan people on Wall Street.</p>
<p>Alex,
I always giggle at your declamatory statements such as, "I personally don't care what the general public thinks because the general public is ignorant...so is anybody who thinks Cal and Michigan aren't not a top 10 or top 15 universities." Were you stamping your feet as you wrote that? :mad:</p>
<p>Until I came to CC, I had never met anyone who promoted U Michigan anywhere near the level that you do. Over the past two years, I've queried dozens of friends and business associates from a wide variety of industries (none in academia) from locations north, south, east, and west and the answer is always the same for U Michigan. Strong reputation in the Midwest and less so in other regions. Some good undergraduate students, just as there are at places like Boston College or NYU or U North Carolina or U Texas. But not like at the same level and consistency of Dartmouth, Duke and Rice and many other truly top undergraduate colleges.</p>
<p>"IB Recruiters hire as heavily at Michigan as they do at Duke or Dartmouth. Check your facts. I had offers from 4 of the top 10 IBanks 3 months before graduating from college, as did dozens of fellow LSA majors."</p>
<p>Alex: Do you know what you are taking about? Dartmouth and Duke are in the top ten schools for the number of undergrads getting top NYC IB (GS, MS, Lehman, etc.) positions. Ross is not in the top ten at the undergraduate level. I'm sure there are Michigan undergrads going to top investment banks, but a lot of them are the few who turned down Duke, Dartmouth, Yale, etc. at the beginning for financial reasons.</p>
<p>"Cal is all the way on the West Coast, so they are at a geographic disadvantage."</p>
<p>At the undergraduate level, Cal's disadvantage doesn't only come from its geographic location. Look at Stanford, it does very well at linking its undergrads with top NYC IB positions, yet it's in the same geographic location as Cal.</p>
<p>no i'm saying that when i talk to my friends about this stuff, as you and I are curious, they too were curious, and they have access to new hire info. I really have no incentive to be biased about this. </p>
<p>hawk, if anything other than Chicago, Michigan's name helps more in New York, DC, and Silicon Valley. You are like an old uncle who believe in something wrong, and no matter what I or anybody else says, you are stubborn enough to stick to it.</p>
<p>Hardly anyone has even heard of Rice outside Texas-that is an absurd self-serving statement. Outside the northeast and southeast Duke has a very basketball limited reputation.</p>
<p>"Ross is not in the top ten at the undergraduate level. I'm sure there are Michigan undergrads going into top investment banks, but they are mostly the few who turned down Duke, Dartmouth, Yale, etc. for financial reasons.</p>
<p>That is a patently ridiculous assertion. You have NO idea who these hires are or what their other UG choices were.</p>
<p>"Outside the northeast and southeast Duke has a very basketball limited reputation."</p>
<p>barrons,
We are talking about NYC IB recruitment here. You admitted that Duke has a non-"basketball limited reputation" (academic reputation) in the northeast; that reputation serves its undergrads well on Wall Street.
Are you trying to say that Ross is in the top ten at the undergraduate level in terms of top IB recuitment?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>The only reason I mention business and engineering is because it's the only undergraduate majors that USNWR ranks. They should rank other majors too... Also, if a college does not offer engineering, IMHO, it cannot be considered a top college - especially compared to top universities that do offer engineering programs...depth and breadth of quality programs contributes to higher PA score.</p>