<p>What are the colleges/universities that exercise influence or power on a national or international level? </p>
<p>This is NOT about academic rankings; we generally know what universities are highly ranked academically and highly selective. This is about influence or power that extends beyond a particular college/university, whether this influence is widespread or limited only to certain contexts. This influence might involve a particular institution as a whole or only a particular school in the larger institution. This influence might be influenced by administrators/faculty, alumni, reputation, etc. For this thread, influence should be considered in terms of the following categories: foreign policy; political; legal; economic/financial; medical; academic; religious; technology; and international recognition according to region.</p>
<p>Here's my take on it----feel free to suggest others:
Influence in foreign policy: Harvard; Princeton; Yale; Johns Hopkins (SAIS); Tufts (Fletcher); Columbia; Georgetown (SFS); USMA & USNA (via military postgraduate schools)</p>
<p>Economic/Financial: Harvard; Princeton; Chicago; Penn (Wharton)</p>
<p>Academic: Harvard (because it's Harvard); Chicago & Columbia (both representatives of the core curriculum); Brown (representative of the open curriculum); UC-Berkeley & Michigan (the epitomes of the public graduate/research university); Oxford & Cambridge (not American universities, but influential as representatives of the residential college ideal; Oxford also influential via the Rhodes Scholarships and via OUP)</p>
<p>Religious:
In Catholic circles: Notre Dame; Franciscan University of Steubenville (in traditional/conservative Catholic circles)
In other circles: ?</p>
<p>International Recognition:
Worldwide: Harvard
Europe: Columbia; Chicago
East Asia: UC-Berkeley; UCLA; Yale; Columbia; Princeton; Stanford
Southeast Asia: Cornell; Wisconsin
South Asia: Indiana (in Tibetan circles via the Dalai Lama)
Middle East: Georgetown?
Latin America: ?
Africa: ?</p>
<p>I really don’t think Minnesota and Case should be included on there for medicine just because of their proximity to notable medical centers. Despite maybe sharing some resources and offering some joint programs, the Mayo Clinic is not considered a part of UMinn and nor is it the case with CWRU and the Cleveland Clinic. </p>
<p>If you’re going to talk about schools that have the most influence in medicine, I think UCSF, WUSTL, Penn should be included. Pitt also because of UPMC. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>UVA Law doesn’t have anywhere near the power or influence of Harvard or Yale Law.</p>
<p>Re: post #2: You might be right about Minnesota. I thought at one time that Mayo was an affiliate of U Minnesota, but apparently Mayo Clinic operates its own medical school. </p>
<p>Lerner College of Medicine at Cleveland Clinic is part of Case Western Reserve. </p>
<p>Influence of Virginia in the legal world—I’m not sure. Yes, it clearly doesn’t have the influence of Harvard and Yale.</p>
<p>Re: post #3: This is NOT about rankings! Berkeley is a possibility in terms of technology influence, but I think in terms of national public perception, Stanford (Silicon Valley associations) and MIT (the Media Lab, etc) are far above UC-Berkeley. That doesn’t mean UCB isn’t a science and tech powerhouse; it just means it’s not as famous in the public imagination. </p>
<p>Re: Post #4: Definitely BYU, at least in Mormon circles.</p>
<p>Lerner was started less than 10 years ago and has a very, very small incoming class size of ~30 students. Also, the focus of Lerner is to train physician-researchers. It’s respected but definitely doesn’t have influential firepower on the level of Harvard or Hopkins given its size, focus, and the fact that it only recently started training students.</p>
<p>^ ^Ok, I agree Berkeley does have some notoriety for its association with the development of the atomic bomb and it operates the Lawrence Berkeley Lab. </p>
<p>Well, I don’t think the question of the influence or power of social institutions is necessarily silly…of course, there’s always a good deal of subjectivity in such lists…but certainly less silly than the mindless hairspiltting and immature boosterism in the endless rankings threads on this forum.</p>
<p>Prior to Lerner, it’s my impression that there was a fair amount of interchange amongst Cleveland Clinic and Case Western’s medical school, even though CWRU had it’s own affiliated hospital. Cleveland Clinic does have significant national and international reputation—I don’t know how much this will carry over to CWRU. In any case, yes, it’s certainly not at the level of Harvard or Hopkins.</p>
<p>Maybe categorize it as “entertainment industry”. UCLA and NYU have a huge presence in entertainment and this translates into a surprising international influence given the popularity of Hollywood, etc.</p>
<p>Re: Post #12: It’s a reasonable assumption that Harvard is by far the most influential and powerful university across a number of contexts, but a number of other universities are influential in other contexts. Harvard’s influence is not necessarily benign, either. It sets the standard for much that is good, but also sets the standard for the very worst in some areas.</p>
<p>In medicine, you have to look no further than the NIH funding rankings, and there you have:
Harvard 2. Johns Hopkins 3. Penn 4. UCSF 5. Pitt</p>
<p>Honestly, with I’ve been at Penn and am now in SF, and with UPMC’s growing impact at an international level from everything from information technology to the construction of hospitals, Pitt is really more influential in medicine at this point than Penn or UCSF.</p>
<p>It’s a positive development, I think, to see other centers of influence develop besides the traditional leaders in a field. In general, I think Pitt is rising in people’s awareness as a university, and not only in medicine.</p>