Despite being ranked 12th by U.S. News, Vassar holds ‘modest’ ranks when it comes to other popular ranking sites. Even after reading about their different ranking methods and taking into account the fact that Vassar is an LAC, I am still unable to understand this.
(When I talk about ‘modest’ ranks, I mean Vassar is significantly ranked lower than colleges with similar ranks on U.S. News.)
Why is this the case? Which ranking table is more accurate?
P/s: the reason I care this much about the ranking table is because as an international student paying a large amount of money for education, I plan to return to my home country when I graduate. Ranking tables are the only measure of competence and prestige in a country where most people have heard of the Ivy League only. That being said, my prospects of future employment rely partly on these rankings.
In the US, the US News rankings are the ones that most people pay attention to. Rankings are ultimately very subjective, so there’s no “most accurate” ranking.
Further, rankings as such have no discernible bearing on YOU when you graduate and enter the real world, wherever you are.
What employers might as well do is evaluate YOU as a candidate for a role or position based on proven interview methodology. That implies that they establish what they are seeking and you deliver up how and why there may be a fit for the foreseeable future.
So, you see, armed with your resume, interview preparation, scores, references, portfolio of achievements etc, YOU are in a position to deliver what YOU represent.
It’s up to YOU and the future employer. Rankings have nothing to do with job performance - unless you choose to allow it to do so somehow. And if employers are so blinkered as to choose to interview only graduates from certain
“ranked” schools, well, that’s their prerogatve and to their detriment.
None. They use different metrics and will therefore reflect different aspects of the college. Employers in the US won’t care about the rankings. If in your home country they do, then find out which rankings employers in your country respect (for example, in China, people only know the US News rankings of national universities, not even the LACs count).
Why is it hard to understand that two different services, using two very different methodologies, would produce 2 rather different ranks? In my opinion, instead of asking “Which ranking table is more accurate?” a better question (if you value rankings at all) is “Which ranking methodology is more appropriate for my needs?”
T.H.E. uses “performance indicators” grouped into 5 areas. 2 of the 5 are research-oriented, covering research volume, research income, research citations, etc.) All else being equal, these measurements must tend to favor research-oriented national universities, not LACs. If you remove the universities to focus only on the LACs in the T.H.E. table, you’ll see that Vassar is ranked within a few positions of Colby, Colgate, Hamilton, Oberlin, Macalester, Davidson, and Grinnell. US News ranks Vassar within a few positions of the very same LACs.