This is a fascinating discussion.
Different types of schools have different strengths and (relative) weaknesses. There are general well-known pros and cons for private U’s, public U’s, and LACs, and students should choose among them based partly on those pros and cons as they relate to individual fit.
But just about any school can turn out high-quality, highly motivated and high-achieving students. Where they are clustered most (by % of total student pop; analysis is better than bare numbers, IMO) tells us where the students are most driven, and able, to achieve such awards. It does not necessarily, of course, inform us quite as directly regarding the quality of teaching or academics. It can be hard to discern how much of scholarly success is attributable to the abilities and drive of the student vs. the academic environment.
Some teachers can inspire a love of learning. Certainly they may help to nurture the type of academic zeal necessary to win such an award. And maybe those teachers do reside (relatively) more often at the schools that are high up on most of these awards lists. Certainly that could mean that those schools foster learning a little bit better than schools with relatively fewer of such profs. Still, we can’t really know to what degree the academic environment played a role in the award. We know for certain that the quality and drive of the student plays a large one.
The impact of great teaching (and learning environment…) would probably be most obvious if a low-stat kid went on to win one of the illustrious awards mentioned in this thread. That would elicit thoughts like, “Whoa, that school brought that out of her?” Even then, maybe other circumstances/changes were in cahoots to help bring about the change that led to the award. It’s just really hard to know for certain without digging deep – sitting down with the kids to find out what produced the award. And who has time to do that?
So we make lists based on the awards. In this case, the lists show a nice mix of schools, which is good. To me it means there are talented/driven kids and quality faculty at a great many schools – not exactly a new thought, but a refreshing one nonetheless. Maybe we can be satisfied with defining the factors involved in winning an award thus: that it takes at least some intelligence, some drive/inspiration, some level of academic quality – maybe even some luck – to produce one of these awards. And the relative amounts of those factors will necessarily differ individually, requiring some (further) digging.
I, personally, am fine with stating what this thread has made apparent (to me, at least), and leaving it at that:
- The quality of post-secondary students and educators is spread more broadly than some perhaps have been conditioned to believe.
That’s a good thing, I think, especially for those forced to make a difficult college choice: you can get a good education, and be inspired to achieve, and be taught by excellent teachers, at so very many schools.