Michigan cracks the USNWR top 25 for the first time in more than a decade

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Michigan
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The USNWR annual college rankings are out, and the University of Michigan was tied with Carnegie Mellon University at #25. This is the first time the University has been ranked among the top 25 in over a decade.

Michigan’s Peer Assessment rating clocked in at 4.5/5.0 (tied with Brown, Duke and Northwestern).

Ross is ranked #3, tied with Haas. Breaking it down by specialities, Ross is #1 in Management, #1 in Marketing, #2 in Production and Operations Management, #3 in Finance, #4 in Entrepreneurship, #6 in Accounting, #6 in Quantitative Analysis and #10 in International Business.

The College of Engineering was tied at #6 with Carnegie Mellon and UIUC. In terms of of sub-disciplines, the CoE is ranked #2 in Environmental Engineering, #2 in Industrial Engineering, #5 in Materials Engineering, #5 Mechanical Engineering, #6 in Biomedical Engineering, #7 in Civil Engineering, #7 in Computer Engineering, #8 in Aerospace Engineering (this is an unusually low ranking. Michigan is usually ranked among the top 3 in Aerospace) and #10 in Chemical Engineering.

However, the ranking remains far from perfect. The USNWR does very little to audit the data or adjust for institutional size and sources of funding. Cal and Michigan both belong among the top 15 universities in the country, and would be ranked among the top 15 if the methodology made sense and the data were adequately audited.

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LSA isn’t doing too badly either. :smiley:

https://lsa.umich.edu/lsa/news-events/all-news/lsa-in-the-news/forty-lsa-programs-in-the-top-ten–says-new-u-s–news-rankings.html

And moved ahead of UVa for the 3rd ranked public in the USNWR rankings.

What I like as a parent of a student is that UMich is hassle free. No housing issues, no class scheduling issues, no advisor issues, professors/GSI’s communicate with you and want to help you, etc. It’s like a small LAC. :lol:

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What you probably don’t like is the OOS Cost of Attendance of $273,980 for a state flagship, if someone is full pay? Conversely, UCLA and UCB is about half the cost at 140K.

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“Engineering, #8 in Aerospace Engineering (this is an unusually low ranking. “

I noticed that when the grad rankings came out earlier this year. They dropped there as well.

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“#6 in Biomedical Engineering”

I believe this is the College’s highest ranking ever for the concentration.

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“Michigan’s Peer Assessment rating clocked in at 4.5/5.0 (tied with Brown, Duke and Northwestern.”

Good to see the PA score back up to a 4.5!

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Glad to see Northwestern ahead of Duke as well. It’s good to see a BIG school in the top ten.

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And how much do you pay for housing in Westwood and Berkeley versus Ann Arbor for 4 years? OOS tuition at UMich may be $50,000, but housing and food are much cheaper than CA. So, a “full pay” is not laying out $68,000 per year. At least I’m not. No where close.

My kid is now sophomore and we easily found a nice new-ish 4 bedroom apartment a couple blocks from campus for fairly cheap money compared to the Bay Area.

AND if my kid wants to switch majors, or desired a transfer to CS/Engineering, tap the “That Was Easy” button at the corner of your desk. :smiley:

Student-Teacher ratios? Cal and UCLA are 19:1. UMich? 15:1

The cost difference IMO shrinks awfully quickly, when the cost of living is cheaper in MI, the ease of switching majors, smaller class sizes, free tutoring and easy access to advising (my kid a three of them for majors and minors), one of the top college towns in the US, an athletics program that’s 2nd only Stanford in terms of success, $12 Billion endowment, new and newly renovated dorms, dining halls, classrooms and other facilities, etc.

For our family, the OOS cost difference is more than worth it. And six other students from the same HS class agreed too. One of the most popular OOS destinations at our local public HS.

BTW, the COA cost estimate for books is $1,048/year. I spent $58 on Amazon for a couple classes, $50 for a used Orgo textbook, plus the coursepack was another $28. Math textbook was $75. That’s it. A total of $211 for the Fall semester.

And you get Jim Harbaugh and Big Ten football. :lol:

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“Conversely, UCLA and UCB is about half the cost at 140K”

Assuming that sushiritto is from CA. Otherwise…

“The 2019 undergraduate tuition & fees of University of California-Berkeley (UC Berkeley) are $14,184 for California residents and $43,176 for out of State students. After receiving the financial aid, the net price for University of California-Berkeley is $19,073 for California residents and $48,065 for out-of-state students including tuition, fees, books & supplies costs, and living costs…”

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Yes.

One thing I forgot to mention about the OOS costs at UMich. UMich has financial aid available for OOS students:

https://finaid.umich.edu/new-undergraduates/non-resident-students-and-financial-aid/

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First off, I think Michigan is a great college and has one of the best college towns in America. But the numbers don’t lie. According to it’s own website on Cost of Attendance:

Freshman/Sophomore Tuition & fees per year are: $51,200

Junior/Senior Tuition & fees per year jumps to: $54,794

Total Tuition & Fees: $211,988 (not including any other expenses)

Room & Board: $12,000
Books: $1,048
Personal & Misc.$2,454

Total average annual cost over 4 years is a whopping: $68,000 per year.

UCLA’s housing and meals are $16,400 per year or $4,500 more per year than UM. However, UCLA’s tuition is only $13,239.

Even with the high cost of housing in Westwood, the COA difference between a typical in-state student at UCLA and being an OOS student at UM is $133,000. It’s pretty staggering when you think about both are Top 5 public colleges in the U.S. with 30,000 undergrads.

It’s obviously a big luxury for a CA student to spend an additional 133K to be able to attend Michigan’s public flagship.

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We had looked at Michigan and the COA is ridiculously high for an OOS flagship/Public. As much as they talk about financial aid, and it was close to impossible to get. OSU Fisher along with other well-regarded Business schools in the big ten community (Kelley at Indiana, Carlson at Minn) are excellent choices and a little more generous when it comes to scholarships and overall cost. I feel like a lot of these rankings are helpful to a degree, but the end of the day, overall cost of that degree plays a much bigger role.

According to the same rankings, OSU is ranked

Business Programs

10 in Accounting

10 in Finance

4 in Production / Operation Management (tie)

11 in Quantitative Analysis

4 in Supply Chain Management / Logistics

“And you get Jim Harbaugh and Big Ten football. :lol:” OUCH

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According to USNWR:
“High school counselor assessment was dropped from the National Universities and National Liberal Arts Colleges rankings formulas altogether.”

The main reason Michigan moved up into the top 25 IMO. Biased results from the top coastal high schools were holding us back…

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“We had looked at Michigan and the COA is ridiculously high for an OOS flagship/Public. As much as they talk about financial aid, and it was close to impossible to get. OSU Fisher along with other well-regarded Business schools in the big ten community (Kelley at Indiana, Carlson at Minn) are excellent choices and a little more generous when it comes to scholarships and overall cost. “

Ya think? With few exceptions, who in their right minds would pay OOS costs to attend tOSU without “generous” incentives. Michigan charges elite rates like the privates , and gets them, because it is an elite school. This isn’t football boomer. Michigan academically is in a different league compared to Ohio State, even though both are in the BIG. Sorry, but that’s just the way it is.

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You missed the point. I’m writing the actual check. We don’t pay anywhere near $68,000/year. Books, housing, misc., etc. is far cheaper (and available) than what you see on the website. Website estimate versus reality here.

And some OOS kids receive financial aid. Much due to the large endowment and the recently completion of the $5 Billion Victors Campaign: https://news.umich.edu/victors-for-michigan-campaign-final-results/

Ease of switching majors, ease of access to resources (and professors/instructors), a smaller student-teacher ratio, new facilities, etc.

Someone mentioned on another thread that Cal has at least one class with 2,000 kids enrolled. That’s crazy. I’ll pay the extra cost and IMO get my kid a better education.

Cal’s housing problems:
https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/UC-Berkeley-is-making-the-student-housing-crisis-13680589.php

Cal’s rodent problems:
https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/17000-Dorms-at-UC-Berkeley-Plagued-By-Rodent-Problems-508191931.html

Many of my relatives have graduated Cal, including one recently, so I’m not a Cal basher. But a lot kids are going out of state nowadays for various reasons.

IMO, UMich has a lot of added value for the OOS student.

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That’s not what I hear on this board. @Knowsstuff is OOS and I think receives some type of aid. He can correct me if I’m wrong here.

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How did Cal and UCLA do in the peer assessment category?

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Well, you could be rooting for 0-2 UCLA playing #5 Oklahoma this week. :warning:

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I’ll go out on a limb here and state that the cost of annual tuition is what it is and there is not much wiggle room for a “full pay” family without merit. These families are paying 51K - 54K tuition each and every year.

In addition, UCLA’s expenses are also “website estimates” and may also not reflect reality if someone wants to find cheaper housing or live with 5 other roommates to bring the cost down.

What isn’t up to debate is the actual cost of in-state vs OOS tuition fees.

UCLA’s tuition costs for in-state are averaging 13K per year, UM are in the 50K’s per year. No way around it for a full pay family, you WILL pay close to 40K more per year in tuition for the “privilege” of attending UM.

I’m not sure how this is even a discussion? Knock your socks off if you want to pay this premium but please don’t pretend that tuition is much cheaper than what’s stated on the website for “full pay” families.

And if it is significantly cheaper, please share with OOS CC members as we would love to know how our kids can go to UM with tuition that is severely subsidized and makes it very affordable???

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You went from comparing COA’s to comparing tuition. Yes, tuition is more at UMich, by a lot for an OOS student. But other costs, like food, housing, etc. is cheaper in MI than CA, unless you disagree with COL in Westwood and Berkeley versus Ann Arbor.

You missed my earlier post about financial aid, not merit aid. UMich offers FINANCIAL aid to OOS students:

https://finaid.umich.edu/new-undergraduates/non-resident-students-and-financial-aid/

Yes, I’m “knocking my socks off” happy to pay the OOS premium, because I think there’s value being able to get all your classes, free tutoring, easily changing majors, if necessary, cheap(er) and available housing nearby campus, smaller class sizes, collaborative, not a cut-throat, environment, etc. All this adds value to my me and my kid. I’ve always felt paying a premium, if deserved, is/was worth the extra cost. :smile: Don’t you pay more to use the toll/express lanes in SoCal? Same concept.

And you get spend fall Saturdays with 111,000 of your closest friends watching a good football team play Ohio State, Notre Dame, Wisconsin, Iowa, etc. And then later you get to watch your hockey and basketball teams play in the NCAA tournament too.

Finally, UMich moved up two spots from #27 to #25. UCLA moved back one spot from #19 to #20 and Cal remained at #22. Maybe there’s a trend there? Remember the title of this thread: