<p>Behind Columbia at #4, tied with Stanford, ahead of MIT/Caltech at #7. Not bad at all, especially considering their use of dated admissions numbers.</p>
<p>Haha I actually like Penn’s place more now than I did last year. Now, it beats MIT and Caltech and is tied with just Stanford. I am also happy to see Columbia do so well. Its a great school and deserves a bit more recognition (as does Penn).</p>
<p>Sweet. Every year the Penn haters keep predicting a significant drop in the rankings, and they curse us for being ranked even with (or better than) MIT and Stanford. I say Penn is as great a University as there is in the land, but we know what they say about opinions…</p>
<p>I’m also happy Columbia broke through at #4. Maybe now they’ll experience some of the hate we’ve experienced over the past 10 years. It’s cool that during my four years (including this, my last) we’ve averaged the #5 ranking. Not bad at all.</p>
<p>I’d say that somewhere between #5 and #8 or so is about where Penn belongs. Penn is great, of course, but it just isn’t a Harvard or a Yale. If Penn were ranked any higher, it clearly wouldn’t seem legitimate, but if it were any lower, it would give false credence to the haters. At the same time, even though its name recognition may not be as great, I honestly believe that Penn trumps Dartmouth, Duke, and Chicago. Penn certainly beats MIT and Caltech (and most other schools, for that matter) for social science and arts/humanities (with the exception of MIT’s economics department), but there’s no way that they’re in the same league for engineering or natural sciences, so on average I’d say that they even out. In fairness, I think that Stanford probably should be ranked ahead of Penn, but on the other hand, I think that Columbia and Penn are very comparable. So, I’d make my own rankings: 1. Harvard, 2. Stanford, 3. Princeton, 4. Yale, 5. Penn/Columbia/Berkeley, 8. MIT/Caltech, 10. Dartmouth/Chicago. (Yes, from a purely academic standpoint, I think to put a university as incredible as Berkeley at #22 is a travesty.) Something I don’t understand is why Duke is always in the top ten. I realize it’s an excellent institution, but other than medicine/bioscience, only two of its graduate schools/programs (English and statistics, both at #10) breaks into the USNWR top tens. If we use the graduate program rankings as a metric of the quality of the overall academics the school has to offer in each of those fields, then I can’t see how Duke actually deserves to be #9 overall. On the other hand, of course academics isn’t the only criterion, and Duke is quite selective, but Penn and the others in the top 10 (except Dartmouth) all boast far greater representation in the departmental rankings than Duke does.</p>
<p>But I don’t want to seem like a Duke hater when we all so loathe Penn haters ;-).</p>
<p>Sorry, I also discovered that Duke ranks #9 in political science.</p>
<p>For the record, this is now the 14th year in a row that Penn has been ranked at #4-#7. </p>
<p>As I’ve said before, perhaps after another decade or two, the Penn-haters will start to accept it. ;)</p>
<p>Pennalum</p>
<p>This might sound really elitist, but Berkeley is still a state school…no way it should beat out the likes of Duke/Uchicago/Dartmouth/etc.</p>
<p>Money4Life, state school or no, Berkeley still has the best (by itself or tied) English, history, psychology, chemistry, and computer science departments in the country. It is also top three in mathematics, engineering, earth science, and statistics; and it is top ten in law, business, economics, political science, biological sciences, and physics. This places it, in fact, ahead of every Ivy except Harvard in terms of most number of highly ranked programs. Except for its business school, Dartmouth makes top ten in zero of the above areas, and as I pointed out above, Duke in but three.</p>
<p>In other words, in almost every area that its academic strength can be ranked, Berkeley is at the very top. If the goal of a university is to educate, shouldn’t the quality of the departments offering that education be one of the most important indices of the overall quality of the institution? Maybe the student:teacher ratio is nowhere as good at Berkeley as at Princeton or Dartmouth, but if quality of undergraduate teaching were the only factor in the rankings, there wouldn’t be much point in ranking the national universities and liberal arts colleges separately–and, in fact, the LACs would probably dominate.</p>
<p>Of course I’m glad Penn consistently gets recognized as one of the top 7 schools in the nation, but I do think it’s foolish to put stock into this. I think the main problem with this is people treat the ranking as though US News held a meeting and discussed what order to rank the schools…“Well you see, X does have better programs in 1, 2, and 3 than Y but Y is more undergraduate focused.” They spit out rankings based on statistic-based methodology.</p>
<p>This year they increased the weight of predicted 4-year graduation rates (which, I believe, unfairly hurts MIT and Caltech–lower graduation rates at these incredibly difficult schools does not make them inferior institutions in any way) and included HIGH SCHOOL COUNSELOR assessments. Is that a joke?</p>
<p>The rankings at the top thus can’t really be separated in any meaningful way. To say Columbia is better than Stanford and Penn, or that Columbia “deserves” the boost, doesn’t make sense. I know this argument has been made hundreds of times, but I feel it’s especially relevant when random changes to methodology produce these changes so US News can sell more magazines. </p>
<p>If they actually ranked on quality of programs (however one chooses to measure that–research output, faculty awards, etc), the rankings might have more value.
Pennalum, “If we use the graduate program rankings as a metric of the quality of the overall academics the school has to offer in each of those fields, then I can’t see how Duke actually deserves to be #9 overall.” Unfortunately, they don’t, so those metrics do not account for why it’s at #9, or why Stanford and Penn are both #5 (because let’s be honest–I’m a Penn student, but Stanford should be ranked higher than Penn and Columbia based on metrics you mention, and metrics I agree with).</p>
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</p>
<p>Not to mention, universities at which a significant number of students stay a 5th year for combined bachelor’s and master’s degrees. </p>
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</p>
<p>A bad joke.</p>
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</p>
<p>Um, congratulations??</p>
<p>I agree fully with pennalum – putting Berkeley at #22 (and Michigan at #29) is a travesty.</p>
<p>
Um, thanks?? ;)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Um, um…you’re welcome??? ;);)</p>
<p>
Indeed.</p>
<p>US News probably hopes that this will garner more support for the rankings among guidance counselors and, consequently, among those they “counsel.”</p>
<p>Penn’s stats should be taken with a whopping big bag of salt. One of the reasons they make it where they do on the list is because they manage the class rank percentage and the yield. </p>
<p>The class rank percentage is supposed to measure how many students at the top of their high schools join the school. Since fewer and fewer schools rank, Penn can just report the percentages based on those who do. Thus greatly overstating the % age of high rankers they really attract. </p>
<p>They fill nearly a third of the class as ED (the highest proportion amongst any of the Ivyies) thus significantly increasing their yield number. </p>
<p>By managing these numbers, Penn greatly improves its rankings at the expense of those who do not.
Perhaps this is what they teach their students at Wharton</p>
<p>^ Except:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>ALL schools, by definition, only report the high school class ranks of accepted applicants or matriculants whose high schools actually provide ranks. Not sure what your point is.</p></li>
<li><p>The yield number is not a component of the US News ranking.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Burnnnnnnnn</p>
<p>Not to mention Penn actually fills about 45% its class ED, which is similar to Columbia…not that it supports your claim since yield isn’t factored, but just shows that you’re off-base on that data as well.</p>
<p>I find it pretty telling that all the colleges with threads about the new Rankings seem to be those who feel like they have “something to prove” whereas the forums of all the schools who are already established as being the top tier (those so affectionately termed HYPSMC on these boards) are paying no heed, regardless of whether they moved up or down.</p>
<p>Seriously, guys, as soon as we stop putting any worth in this nonsense, we’ll be able to focus on what’s more important, like things other than arbitrarily comparing ourselves to other colleges that offer entirely different experiences.</p>