<p>Anyone know if USNWR's Peer Assessment scores are comparable across their Univ & College groupings?</p>
<p>That is, is a 3.4 peer score in the Best National Universities bucket comparable to a 3.4 in the Liberal Arts or Regional Master's buckets?</p>
<p>I have not found the fine print that describes their (controversial) process. Do they give the raters one big universal list of colleges & universities & then ask them to rate relative to the entire pool, or do they split the pools up (into the groups reported in the magazine) then ask raters to just consider their scoring within that particular pool?</p>
<p>Example....UVA (National Univ group) has a peer score of 4.3, the same as Villanova (North Master's group), same as Pomona (Liberal Arts group). By my rough judgment, these schools do not seem like they would be scored the same if they were in one common pool.</p>
<p>They're not even comparable to each other. Most of the folks surveyed can't even put Albertson College on a map, let alone provide a "peer assessment". They don't know their peers at other institutions very well if at all, they don't know what courses are taught or to what level; they have no clue as to the quality of campus discourse. You can be sure that in most if not all cases, Ph.D.-granting institutions will have higher scores to comparable liberal arts ones, as they know nothing about the quality of their peers' undergraduate educations, and plenty about their graduate schools.</p>
<p>If you want something more substantial, the student assessments of academic quality and quality of campus life at the COFHE schools will provide better information, but most of the schools ain't talkin'.</p>
<p>(The situation you describe suggests to me that, academically, Villanova is the superior institution, as it achieved its score with the peers knowing absolutely the least about it.)</p>
<p>I think your example pretty much answers your question, even though I don't know any more about the mechanics than you do. It seems unlikely that Regional Master's group rankings are intended to be comparable to National University rankings. I doubt that even the faculty and administration of Villanova would rate itself on a par with UVa or Pomona (or the other National Universities and LACs with similar ratings), although they are very proud of their institution.</p>
<p>As between National Universities and National Liberal Arts Colleges, one might expect more comparability. But still, I bet that LACs are being measured against one another, not against the world. As I remember it, Amherst and Harvard have closely equivalent ratings, too, as befits the lofty reputation of each. But I have to believe that if you switched faculties and facilities, Harvard's rating would go down. The schools are being judged based on what they try to do, not against a single standard.</p>