Musings on the High School Guidance Counselors Picks

College Search & Selection
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<p>Thoughts on the High School Guidance Counselors Picks...</p>

<pre><code>2010 saw a new category added to the USNWR methodology—the opinions of Guidance Counselors. I am sure that this has been discussed ad nauseam—the pros/cons, IUPUI???, your guidance counselor!, the 21 percent response rate, etc. etc. etc.

When I first took a look at it, I noticed some peculiarities in schools that the guidance counselors seemed to “like” compared to the “actual” USNWR rankings. Upon closer inspection, my suspicions were confirmed and I compiled a list of the 25 schools that the guidance counselors “over-ranked.”*
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<p>Frankly, I was surprised how easily many of these schools could fit into “categories”. Out of the top 25, I was able to create the following categories:
1) Flagship Public Schools
2) Regional schools
3) Schools with a “specialty”
4) Brown and Cornell (lesser Ivies)**
And then of course IUPUI, which while I am sure is a fine school, but seems like an outlier within these rankings. </p>

<p>As one would assume, many flagship public schools ranked higher in the eyes of guidance counselors. The reasoning is that counselors would presumably be more familiar with schools in their region. That accounts for Minnesota, Texas A&M, Texas, Berkeley, UNC, and Michigan. I did find it curious that Wisconsin and Penn State did not enjoy a boost from counselors within their region. Of course, this could be one adverse effect of only having 21% of counselors respond to the survey.</p>

<p>The next group of schools that I have labeled as “regional schools” also came as no surprise. Being from the northeast, schools like Fordham, BC, BU, and Northeastern are very popular and all great schools. The former two are Catholic schools and in predominately Catholic areas (like where I am from), this adds to their prestige.*** Pepperdine, while not in the northeast, is another school similar to the aforementioned. Again, this makes perfect sense, because guidance counselors are going to be sending quite a few students to these schools and would thus be more familiar with them. This idea of “familiarity” is a theme I will expound upon as the rest of the schools are examined.</p>

<p>Colorado School of the Mines, Virginia Tech, Purdue, Georgia Tech, Carnegie Mellon, American, George Washington, Georgetown, Tufts, Syracuse, and Johns Hopkins. All of these schools have something in common: they are all well known for something (or a few things). The first four schools all have top-notch engineering programs, CMU has engineering and theatre, American and GW have great IR programs, Georgetown has the School of Foreign Service, Tufts has Fletcher, Syracuse has Newhouse, and Johns Hopkins has SAIS. Guidance counselors, heck the public at large, will be more familiar with these fancy programs that are among the best at what they do in the country. </p>

<p>However, this is where the biggest problem arises concerning the Guidance Counselor’s picks—they are not judging the institution as a whole, their judgment is clouted with the prestige of a fancy program. Sure, there is some value in that, for an individual interested in Nuclear Engineering, you can’t get much better than GT. Or for the aspiring Pulitzer Prize winner, Newhouse is a great fit. These counselors were not asked to rate a specific college within the university, but the institution as a whole.</p>

<p>Nonetheless, this survey and its results help illustrate that folks are going to regard things they are more familiar with more highly. Perhaps there is some merit in these rankings; perhaps they are an absolute abomination. They do reinforce to me the need to evaluate schools for yourself. As I pointed out earlier, you need to figure out what is important to you. For some, the Colorado School of Mines is the best school on the planet. However, for people who can barely program an alarm clock, it might not have much to offer. </p>

<p><em>This is not in a derogatory sense but in the literal sense.
</em>I do not know what to do with Brown and Cornell. I find it interesting that they are considered the “lesser Ivies.” I am assuming that their status as Ivy League schools leads to some inflation by the guidance counselors who are impressed by the prospect of sending a student to the Ivy League. Nonetheless, this could just be the result of a 21% completion rate of the survey.
**I would also put Villanova into this category and I would be interested in seeing where Villanova would rank according to the opinions of Guidance Counselors. By the same token, I would put Tulane in this category too. I suspect that Hurricane Katrina prevented Tulane from more praise from the guidance counselors.</p>

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<p>My thought - you could after the fact justify any school just as easily. Most schools have some specialty. All schools are in a certain region.</p>

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<p>I think the point was that some schools have a very high academic level in one or two specialties, but otherwise would not be considered outstanding. By having a department that is head and shoulders above the quality of the other departments at the school, the entire school is perceived as higher quality than it is. I am not saying this is right or wrong, I just think that is what the OP meant.</p>

<p>As far as schools being in a certain region, well of course. But no one would call Harvard a regional school. Same for Stanford, Notre Dame, many others. Again, I think what the OP meant was schools that are far more known within their region than otherwsie. Until somewhat recently, WUSTL fell into this category. While it is probably fair to say it is still known more in the midwest than nationally, it is much less of an issue than it used to be.</p>

<p>Using high school guidance counselor opinions is beyond absurd. Besides scientific errors such as regional bias, lack of correction for population density, etc., as a group they are hardly expert on the quality of these undergraduate institutions. I am willing to bet that if they were quizzed on certain basic facts about many of these schools, it would show a near complete lack of knowledge as to a variety of pertinent factors regarding the schools. I am not knocking the HSGC, it would be ridiculous to expect them to know this stuff. They know most about the ones close by and the state school, less about the state school next door, obviously know the famous schools, and otherewise it is hit or miss, mostly miss.</p>

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<p>I think fallenchemist articulates the problem very well.</p>

<p>These were the 25 schools with the biggest discrepancy between the counselors picks and the USNWR rankings (and the differences in rankings):</p>

<p>IUPUI *
Colorado School of Mines 37
American 32
Virginia Tech 27
Northeastern 22
BU 21
Purdue 21
Minnesota 17
GWU 16
Texas A&M 16
Georgetown 15
GT 13
Pepperdine 11
CMU 10
Texas 10
Brown 9
Cornell 9
UC-Berkeley 9
Tufts 9
Boston College 9
Fordham 9
UNC 8
Syracuse 8
Johns Hopkins 7
Michigan 7</p>