Name recognition. U.S. News, and academic mission of an university

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Chicago ✅
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<p>Reading these posts and the overconcern about "reputation" seems counter to the mission and ethos of U of C which I think of as a model of academic inquiry in an university setting. Although it may change, I don't think U of C as a school is overly concerned with its brand name. It seeks scholars-faculty and students, foremost and desires to build a common learning community. Although I didn't attend U of C for my formal education, I did my medical residency at the university hospital. I have the highest respect for the institution as a whole.</p>

<p>There is another thread discussing U of C's name recognition (over 14,000 hits and counting!) so it seems to be a topic of great interest. I thought I would put a new thread to address the issues of changing perceptions of academic reputations, which I believe is different than name recognition. Additionally, what role, if any, do the various college guides and rankings shape the general public's as well as academic communities views on these matters. What I find amazing is that so many people seem to place "objective" value on an extremely "subjective" matter. U.S. News introduces a number of factors that they use to determine their rankings but the choice of the factors and their relative weighting are highly subjective. Using various numerical data in ranking formulas does not legitimize the process and make it objective, although many people seem to treat it so. I was particularly saddened by one student from California who felt disappointed that somehow University of Chicago did not get the name recognition, and by extension, the respect (perhaps to the student?) that he felt it should at his church. I honestly believe that the purpose of going to college is to obtain the best possible education in the full sense of the term rather than obtaining a degree or credential. Without making a political point, our President has obtained degrees from outstanding institutions but that does not mean he necessarily received a full education at any one of them. When he first ran for President in 2000 he was woefully ignorant of international and current events. Don't want to go any further......</p>

<p>I would also add the reputations of universities/colleges do change albeit gradually. One of the early posters on this thread waxed effusively about Stanford vs. Chicago. When I applied to college in the pre-IT era, I would say that Chicago's reputation academically (sports teams notwithstanding) was higher than Stanford's both as a university and as an undergraduate college. Likewise, Dartmouth, Columbia, and Brown were thought to be academically equivalent or even more preferable than Princeton among the Ivies for undergrad education as the latter was still trying to diversify and shed its social elite eating club reputation. U.S. News has annointed Princeton as number one the past few years but that has not always been the case among the general public. I think the high focus on rankings by prospective students, their parents, and unfortunately institutions themselves end up distorting the college selection process which I feel ultimately is finding the best match where a student can be happy and achieve his or her full potential. I also think it also can distort the academic missions of instutions, if administrators try to make their college fit a particular "mold" in order to improve rankings.</p>

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<p>Nice post. Many very good points.</p>

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<p>I agree with you completely, but I think it's hard for students and parents to have this kind of foresight. For them, what you take with you once your four years are over is not necessarily a great education, but bragging rights and a solid, marketable degree. If an enlightening education comes in that mix, that's great, but I think there's a reason that so many families are willing to spend so much on college when there's a solid state school only a few hours away.</p>

<p>U of C definitely delivers that academically enlightening experience. I'm in the middle of talking to many of my friends after their first years of college, who are working hard and having fun at other top schools, and while we're all angered at the high percentage of smokers at our schools and completely obsessed with playing Super Smash Bros., it seems that Chicago really stands out from every other school in the emphasis placed on teaching and on learning. That's what sold me on the school.</p>

<p>For other students, though, they might be concerned about how others view and evaluate them, and they might want to feel like they can hold their heads more highly if they go to a better recognized school. This name-recognition tends to backfire, at times... my good friend is going to Harvard next year, and I can't begin to talk about the garbage she gets about going there from other students who didn't get in. When she proposed that the college admissions process should be more private and that parents should not share information about their children and other students in their grade, she was shot down for being the "whiny Harvard girl." She is also being criticized for attending the school only because it's prestigious, etc.</p>

<p>What other people don't know is that she doesn't particularly love Harvard-- it was her favorite of the schools she got into, but that's not saying much.</p>

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<p>I'm not a fan of the UNSWR rankings, but I understand their appeal. Of course, the weighting of their factors, and which factors they use, is a matter of judgment, and of course the factors being weighted include some very subjective ones and lots that effectively double-count the same things. The arbitrariness of the rankings was amply demonstrated this year by the University of Chicago itself, which had a double-digit jump based solely on how it resolved ambiguities in the information rubric, and which would probably jump another couple of places if it attracted 2,000 more applications from kids with little interest in actually attending.</p>

<p>So. The rankings are not perfect, definitive, or authoritative.</p>

<p>But.</p>

<p>They are a good-faith attempt to do an assessment based on pretty widely-shared, mainstream values. USNWR does not have an obvious, idiosyncratic axe to grind (vs. Newsweek's high school rankings). It would be hard to argue that any of the factors it looks at is irrelevant to consumers or illegitimate as an evaluation factor, and it is interesting to see how the institutions stack up against one another that way. There is also real value in inducing the institutions to look at how their own metrics compare with other institutions'. And, while there's not a whole lot of news value in reporting that Harvard and Princeton look really good, the rankings have done a great job of getting people to focus on some lesser known, more regional universities that, on many objective criteria, don't look a whole lot worse.</p>

<p>Reputations do change, and not even so slowly. I'm not certain that in 1960 Stanford was so distinguishable from USC -- pretty strong, ambitious, but second-tier and fundamentally regional. Twenty years later, it was clearly one of the great universities of the world, and twenty years after that it could make a legitimate case to be the greatest. That's essentially the career-span of a few of the professors I knew there (and, perhaps more relevantly, the career span of David Packer). Places like Northwestern, NYU, and Washington University in St. Louis are in the middle of a clear upward curve. And, sadly, as the Antioch College example shows, things can go the other way as well. But that's the kind of "creative destruction" that gives vitality to our unplanned, basically market-oriented system, and it has worked pretty darn well in the past century.</p>

<p>(I disagree with some of pmyen's assessments of the past, however, although with the caveat that I don't know exactly when s/he's talking about. When I was looking at colleges in the early mid-70s, there was no question about the primacy of the HYP triumvirate. Dartmouth was right behind -- somewhere a reasonable person might prefer to any of the prior three -- and the rest of the Ivies were seen as another half-step down, and not necessarily superior to a number of similar places like Hopkins, Stanford, or Chicago, not to mention Michigan, Berkeley, or Virginia. The top LACs were quite prestigious, but the notion of a kid who considered himself fundamentally an intellectual going to Williams would have been laughable. Wesleyan or Swarthmore were a different story.)</p>

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<p>I believe Chicago moved from 15 to 9, so I think JHS meant it moved from double digits to single digits, rather than a "double-diget jump." A jump of six places because one school paid more attention to how they provided some of their data underscores the meaninglessness of the individual schools rank. I recall that the USNWR editor commented that there is so little difference in "scores" between the top schools that the schools one through ten are essentially the same, but if the public wants to think there is a difference, so be it. And that pretty much sums it up.</p>

<p>It is also interesting in what people include when asked what makes a top school, or why Princeton or Harvard are ranked one and two year after year (with the exception of the year when CalTech was #1), even in peer review. Academic or curricular quality is not necessarily at the top of the list. Being around future leaders, extracurricular activities, and being near well known faculty (even if speaking to them is rare), name recognition among student-peers, often is as, or more, important. </p>

<p>Chicago's prestige has always come from its curriculum and dedication to undergraduate teaching, while at the same time maintaining its status as a great research university. Its pursuit of knowledge through inquiry is legendary and often envied by so-called peer institutions. I doubt this will ever show up in any rating system.</p>

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<p>I wonder if anyone thinks by going to U of C, you are at least partially sacrificing a degree for a better education, because that seems to be suggested here by some people. That, or I'm reading things wrong. I think there is probably some truth to that statement however.</p>

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<p>I guess it depends who is looking at your degree. I know people who would esteem a UChicago degree higher than a Harvard degree, because they think a UChicago degree shows an unusual commitment to academics and a high level of intelligence, whereas a Harvard degree shows the latter but not necessarily the former. </p>

<p>However, I though these people are in the distinct minority, I think they are in places that matter to me. When I've applied for jobs, prospective employers were amazed that I was attending the U. of C., and I have a feeling I was applying for jobs where students from the Ivy Leagues and other high-level universities were not uncommon. I think that says more about me and the kind of job I was applying for, though.</p>

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<p>JHS,
Thanks for your comments. I applied to colleges not too long after you did. I attended a competitive public high school in the Boston area. There really were no rankings back then, although my classmates and I had some sense of the relative academic reputations of various universities and colleges. However, I do not think that was the single determining factor in our college decisions. In fact, many of my classmates, including myself, chose top LACs over top Ivies. Additionally, I think some of the colleges I mentioned may have had more regional pull as there were more opportunities to know alumni and it was easier to visit those campuses since they were closer to home. Where I lived, there certainly were more alumni, parents, and teachers in my h.s. from Brown and Dartmouth, than Princeton. Given this familiarity, applications to those schools from my classmates were much higher than to Princeton. The impressions we had of Princeton were probably inaccurate (perhaps even biased by reading the Great Gatsby junior year!) but we had no way to verify them as none of my close friends even visited Princeton unless they were accepted. Likewise, my classmate who attended U of C, did not visit until after he was accepted. I also remember when a classmate decided to attend Duke, most of us wondered why someone would go so far south to attend a good school. Perhaps for a student from NYC or NJ, Princeton would have been more familiar at a personal level and easier to visit, and thus made a stronger impression. This relative parochialism is definitely a phenomenon of the past. The world is a smaller place as students visit colleges much farther away. They fly rather than drive or take a bus. The internet also has brought the campus experience-sometimes live-into the student's home. One can take virtual tours now. I still remember looking at college catalogs with virtually no pictures in our public library. Additionally, the common app which Chicago will soon adopt, makes it much easier to apply to colleges so typically students apply to many more than we did. Last, I think that colleges themselves have tried to market themselves on their websites, catalogs, and road shows. When I applied, colleges did little of that. It was a bit unseemly as most felt that the excellence of their respective programs was self-evident (perhaps not). Moreover, LACs like Amherst, Swarthmore, and Wesleyan, (and I would suspect great universities like Chicago) and their students did not seem to perseverate over the name recognition of their college but were content, even enthusastic, about attending someplace where they were getting a great education. I am also reminded that this is the era that Allan Bloom wrote about in his book "The Closing of the American Mind." Perhaps a combination of factors in academia ranging from overemphasis on multiculturalism (I say this as a racial minority myself), PC-ness, and the commercialization of the college experience (with quality of food and dorms touted by schools and weighed by students more than the quality of profs) coloring the college selection process. Sadly, in many cases, colleges and students both look at undergraduate education as a product rather than a special opportunity in a critical time of a student's life.</p>

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<p>pmyen: I have posted this link before, but I believe you might be interested in seeing it. <a href="http://iotu.uchicago.edu/levine.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://iotu.uchicago.edu/levine.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>One thing I find consistently in threads like this is moderate (major?) disapproval of those that want to go to a school with name recognition. If I'm paying $50,000 per year, why not? After all, other research has shown (except for Hoxby's work maybe) that there is not a lot of difference in life outcome for grads of most schools, whether they went public, private, well known or not etc. So if you want a bumper sticker that will turn heads, why not?</p>

<p>Now for a coment to the OP regarding Duke and Princeton. As the parent of a relatively recent grad of a Boston area HS, I can tell you that the perspective of the Boston area to colleges is rather unique. Whereas the NYC area sends tons of kids to Duke, Pton and U. Va (just to use a few examples) the Boston area does not, to the extent that Duke does much less recruiting in Boston. And Yale poses an interesting case, too. Whereas my D's HS class had 14 kids attend Harvard, none went to Yale. And the admissions bar for Yale seems much higher. Rumor has it that Yale did not want to affect its yield by accepting Boston area kids who would turn down Yale to go to Harvard anyway.</p>

<p>Back to Chicago, the school regularly draws 4-5 kids from D's HS each year. Not bad for a school in flyover country?</p>

<p>BTW, D is doing well: jr. year PBK among other awards recently. (can't say too much or someone would be able to pierce the anonynimity veil to figure out who she is. She would not be happy then.)</p>

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<p>idad,
Great article. This type of honest and open self-reflection at an instutional level is what makes Chicago-Chicago. Let's hope that Chicago stays Chicago.</p>

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<p>Looks like Bob Zimmer is carrying on the tradition of self-reflection in the context of The University's values (he says with crossed fingers): <a href="http://www-news.uchicago.edu/releases/06/061027.zimmer.shtml%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www-news.uchicago.edu/releases/06/061027.zimmer.shtml&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>"I wonder if anyone thinks by going to U of C, you are at least partially sacrificing a degree for a better education, because that seems to be suggested here by some people. That, or I'm reading things wrong. I think there is probably some truth to that statement however."</p>

<p>One friend told me that. He ended up choosing Penn even though he seemed to like Chicago better. It's hard to knock the Ivy League.</p>

<p>Here's the thing: name recognition is important, I don't care what you guys say. I'm going to this school not because I don't care about name recognition, but because everything else outweighs that. That said, I still get miffed when people insinuate that having a caring about having strong brand name is counter to the University's goals. </p>

<p>There's no doubt in my mind that Chicago will give you probably the best education in the US. But it doesn't mean that schools people like to bash (Harvard, primarily) are insufficient. Sometimes people act like all Ivy League schools languid hellholes of ignorance, cruel professors, and cut throat future investment bankers. </p>

<p>Why do so many people keep bashing Harvard? Someone said that they know people who respect a Harvard degree less than Chicago degree...nice anecdote, but it's still extremely rare. Probably 5 standard deviations if you ask me. </p>

<p>Fact of the matter is that reputation is important. College lasts four years. Your degree stays with you the rest of your life. If you're a Harvard alum, Chicago alum, Michigan alum...you are and will be for the rest of your life. Some people like to know that they have a good label on this. It draws more respect, and whether you care or not about other people's opinions, it's always good to have their respect.</p>

<p>So I personally applaud Zimmer and his goals to move Chicago into a bigger position nationally.</p>

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<p>I think there's this tug between Chicago as a hermetic liberal arts school (think: St. John's College, Reed) and Chicago as a world-class institution. In reality, Chicago is both, which is great for me, because I wanted to attend both.</p>

<p>Zimmer seems too keen on pulling the school in line with the Ivy League. I like the idea that the school is getting more street cred, and more and more students are calling Chicago "their" school. It's easier to call Chicago "their" school when it matches up very comfortably with the Ivies on paper and people talk about it. However, I think he wants to morph the school into an Ivy League in that he wants the school to be known not only in academia, but also as a hotbed for pre-professionals. (The former is much more universally desirable than the latter, and if we could convince students that we prepare for professions just as well as any other top school, we could get more applicants, etc).</p>

<p>If that happened, though, in that the school stressed preprofessionalism alongside academia, I would no longer want to attend. One of the reasons Chicago appealed to me was that you DIDN'T go SPECIFICALLY to get a job-- you went to experience the school, and if you wanted a job, you got one. To me, college is college, a job is a job, and the two have little to do with each other. I don't mind going to school with students who have professional aspirations, but I want to go to school with students who want to learn something outside of their intended major and career path. Chicago's core anchors you down that way.</p>

<p>(A neighbor's son got into a prestigious med-school-guaranteed undergraduate program and expressed an interest in minoring in philosophy. "What is he going to do with that, read Descartes to his patients?" my neighbor asked me).</p>

<p>And when I mentioned that the Chicago got me more street-cred than Harvard, I think it was a function of the kind of program I was applying for (an enrichment program for gifted students). In that context, Chicago could be seen as a more appreciated degree because it more explicitly indicates a love of learning and a commitment to academic pursuits. Chicago students tend to actively seek out educational positions and grad schools, though, and do well with even the most competitive programs. Chicago doesn't do as well as most Ivies with professional school placement, though. However, I'm hesitant to put the school at a fault without seeing what kinds of students are applying to professional schools. Most of the top students I know continue on to get MA's and PhD's instead of professional degrees; the top students I know who are going on to get professional degrees are going on to the likes of Harvard Law School and one received a major scholarship to UMich's med school.</p>

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<p>idad that was great. My favorite part was the william james quote:</p>

<p>Chicago University has during the past six months given birth to the fruit of its ten years of gestation under John Dewey. The result is wonderful-a real school, and real Thought. Important thought, too! Did you ever hear of such a city or such a University? Here [at Harvard] we have thought but no school. At Yale a school but no thought. Chicago has both." (3)</p>

<p>Also, about this Zimmer character's machinations, does anyone know if that's going to impact admissions? If they are aiming to toe the Ivy league line, will pressure be put on the admissions office to accept less or stop accepting the kinds of applicants they have in the past (i.e. intelligent, accomplished and passionate learners and intellectuals, though not necessarily those with the best stats or whatever)?</p>

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<p>Muffinking,
"Your degree stays with you the rest of your life." So does your education.</p>

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<p>Yes but in large part if you're motivated you can educate yourself. You don't need to be spoonfed. And it's not like Harvard is a second rate education. You can, for a large part, impact your education. You can't change where your degree comes from. Most people who sell out to the Ivy League know this. </p>

<p>And I wish people would stop acting like UChi is the Virgin Mary of academic purity. Law School and GSB are excellent schools, which ironically, also happen to be professional schools. So it's not like the faculty isn't involved in the culture of professionalism.</p>

<p>I don't think Zimmer would do that. One, he seems committed to making sure Chicago retains its uniqueness. And two, O'Neil I think has more say over that. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like some of the things the college is doing (like going common app) are sort of "finding direction by misdirection" if you know what I mean. They're playing the game a little bit (because national recognition is just a good thing in general), but at the same time remaining to themselves true. I mean what's he going to do? Scrap the core? They'll sink his body to Lake Michigan. </p>

<p>I think it's more like a "Hey, you people, we are Chicago and we ROCK and you need to know about us." But then again maybe I'm just a hopeless optimist.</p>

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<p>Maybe.</p>

<p>About the sinking his body into Lake Michigan... don't doubt it! Hugo Sonnenschein a bunch of years back "watered down" the core by making it more doable, and he had to resign as president. People are still angry at him, even though he did end up making the school more marketable and more desirable overall.</p>

<p>One of the most popular t-shirts around campus is the "I am Uncommon" shirt, protesting the Common App (and yes, declaring ourselves better than everybody else). For a school that's perceived to have a major chip on its shoulder for not being an Ivy and not being Northwestern, you'd be surprised how spirited the students are in keeping things the way they are.</p>

<p>And Chicago does have great professional programs, but to an undergrad's point of view, they might as well be operating in Siberia. I believe they just started an econ-major pre-businessy program (realizing that a top econ undergrad program blends with a top graduate business program! wow!) and you can cross-register with grad classes, but other than that there is a major wall between pre-professionals and undergrads that happen to be going to the same school.</p>

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<p>ahh! UoC is going to common app? When I attended a talk a couple months ago by Oneill, et al, they made no mention of this and referenced the Uncommon app at length..</p>

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<p>I believe Libby (The U of C counselor who posts on this forum for newcomers) said this year Chicago is remaining with the uncommon app. When the common app is adopted only the common information parts will be used, with the Chicago essays still required. Further, the uncommon application will remain an option. The goal is to reach URM's and other Chicago qualified students who might not otherwise think to apply.</p>