<p>amen to kelbian
that almost rhymed</p>
<p>Kelbian’s right; of the top 7 universities, only Penn and Columbia have vibrant rankings threads. I agree that it’s because, of those top 7, Penn and Columbia are probably the least prestigious. We have the most to benefit from said association with our peers.</p>
<p>But I disagree with Klebian’s prescription. Judith Rodin was plain in her desire to elevate Penn to HYPSM status. But will a telling dearth of internet rankings chatter be the final step down that path? The rankings-obsession has to subside naturally.</p>
<p>I pretty openly admit that Penn has something to prove to the rest of the world. I also admit that Penn (as well as Columbia probably), at least at the undergraduate level, are not on the same level as HYPS, or MIT/Caltech for the sciences/engineering…but that’s not to say that it cannot one day be. Considering how far Penn has come already, the time has come to start focusing on factors in addition to undergraduate selectivity, namely, faculty recruitment. The reason HYPSMC have the reputation they do is not first and foremost because of the students (most Harvard grads are not noticeably better off than Penn grads, for example), but because of the quality of the education they offer–that is, the academics they attract and the research output they produce. This produces revenue and esteem for the institution, and serves to attract other promising faculty members as well, and at the level of graduate education, more and more talented students to populate the research spaces.</p>
<p>And then the physical space of the institution is also an issue; that a place looks good exerts a synergistic effect with a good estimation of its academic quality. In other words, people will go to an unattractive campus if the education is superb, but they’ll probably go to the more attractive campus if the quality of education is equivalent. Penn is definitely making major strides in this department through Penn Connects, but then there’s still the nagging issue of the, uh, the monolithic, penitentiary-chic library looming over the green (and the fact that Penn is planning on renovating the top floor doesn’t inspire hope in me that Van Pelt will be replaced or even receive a facelift anytime this century), the dire social work quad (again, the new entrance to the Caster Building dashed my hopes for the previously vaguely-projected redo of that relic of cheap mid-century institutional architecture), etc. I kind of like the fact that Penn’s beautiful buildings are a bit of a hodgepodge architecturally, lacking the monotony of Princeton or Harvard (pretty though they are in their own rights), but I wish that that m</p>
<p>^I agree with you. Harvard, Princeton, Yale all give off an incredible sense of “WOW” through their campuses and, IMO, inspire a sense of quality and prestige. Penn doesn’t have that vibe at all. If the world were a perfect place, people would realize that doesn’t really matter, but in reality it probably does have an effect. I think the physical appearances of HYP help solidify in people’s minds that notion of prestige. Penn isn’t insulated like every other Ivy (yes, even Columbia…), and it isn’t the most cohesive or awe-inspiring campus, and it probably does suffer from this appearance. </p>
<p>Then you have MIT which is absolutely atrocious save for a few landmarks, yet it probably has little to no effect on public perception because it is already known as the premiere science/tech in the country. But Penn has not garnered such a reputation.</p>
<p>BTW, I don’t think it’s ironic that Meyerson is ugly (although I think more highly of it than most). Take a look at design school buildings at different schools and you’ll notice most of them are hideous. Supposedly, it’s to avoid influencing design/art students. Harvard’s is abominable.</p>
<p>Some of you should know that not everybody who attends Penn looks at the grass being greener on the other side. I get all the “wow” I need at Penn. It’s a beautiful campus that is both insulated from and integrated within University City, and it’s literally 1000x better than being at Princetonthe most boring college town there is of all the Ivies (save maybe Ithaca). Harvard and Yale are powerful names, but really, what “wow” are you talking about that students get there that students at Penn don’t get? Oh I get it, it’s the ghosts of past presidents? Or maybe it’s their endowments that make the students there go “wow!” </p>
<p>Please people, get real. I hope no current or former Penn students are the one’s spewing that nonsense on this thread.</p>
<p>Heh, I went to Penn, and am very proud of my Penn BA. No school is perfect, and if my biggest complaint about Penn is that it has a smattering of unattractive buildings, I’d say that speaks pretty highly of the place. I think the Penn campus is second to none in its balance of being at once a cohesive campus (even though CAPA feels it isn’t so cohesive, I think that being geographically contiguous and easily discerned from the surroundings, unlike, say, NYU, does lend a sense of cohesion overall) that is not sealed off from the rest of its world (as is, for example, Columbia). Penn is also unique among the Ivies (and others!) in being organized around a central campus artery lined with gorgeous, leafy old shade trees (Locust Walk, for those who don’t know) rather than a large quadrangle or series of quadrangles (e.g., Columbia, Dartmouth, Yale, Harvard, Brown) or with no discernible organizational scheme to the campus (e.g., Princeton, Cornell). As I mention above, I also like the way Penn’s campus is not solely in one architectural mode, which is not necessarily un-cohesive-seeming to me; the buildings (at least the nice ones) do fit together in the context of the campus. (The idea that Princeton or WashU are building their new buildings to look like their “old” ones seems pathetically stuck in the past in a way.) But let’s not pretend that most of us don’t/didn’t wince at Van Pelt, McNeil, or, perhaps worst of all, Stiteler…one worm doesn’t spoil a whole barrel of apples, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t strive for a completely wormless barrel. I love Penn too much to want to see it stagnate and stop looking for ways to improve itself, whether that is in terms of faculty recruitment or physical plant (which, in agreement with CAPA, does matter insofar as it “solidif[ies] in peoples’ minds” a uniformly impressive view of the university.</p>
<p>I did not at all mean to give the impression that I dislike Penn’s campus. Not at all. I quite like it, and I very much agree with the statements about its uniqueness and a cohesive organization (I was referring to its architectural style, but I did not mean it disparagingly). Trust me, I marvel all the time about the smallest details and always appreciate many of its aspects.</p>
<p>What I was implying about HYP’s “wow” factors was not that they make people feel as though they are walking through hallowed halls graced by presidents past and whatnot. I truly believe that their physical appearance–some of their absolutely gorgeous architecture, their pristine grounds, etc.–lend to the perception of their prowess as universities. Just in the same way someone might think low of an unkept, dilapidated campus, I think people have just the opposite reaction to striking physical grounds. I’m not saying Penn is not striking. I love many aspects of the campus. I simply believe that it doesn’t cast the same effect on visitors as Princeton or Yale do. And hey, people might leave Princeton thinking it seems overly manicured and haughty. On the whole, I just think Penn has room for improvement in this area.</p>
<p>CAPA:</p>
<p>Well, I can see your point about Princeton being gorgeous and manicured. However, I thought Harvard was much uglier than Penn and not that extremely well kept. The neighborhood around Yale was scary and the campus was not that amazing either.</p>
<p>If you want to see “manicured”:</p>
<p>[url=<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg]File:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg”>File:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg - Wikipedia]File:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg</a> - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia<a href=“Trinity%20College,%20University%20of%20Cambridge”>/url</a>
[url=<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Oriel_College_First_Quad.jpg]File:Oriel”>File:Oriel College First Quad.jpg - Wikipedia]File:Oriel</a> College First Quad.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia<a href=“Oriel%20College,%20University%20of%20Oxford”>/url</a></p>
![http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg]File:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg%5DFile:TrinityCollegeCamGreatCourt.jpg){kind=link}
![http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Oriel_College_First_Quad.jpg]File:Oriel](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Oriel_College_First_Quad.jpg%5DFile:Oriel){kind=link}
<p>Try as they obviously do, Princeton and Yale have nothing on the originals.</p>
<p>The saying where I come from is “it is what it is,” and that’s my point in reference to the rankings, Penn’s reputation and its campus aesthetics. The fact that any Penn affiliate would argue against the positive recognition the university receives (in comparison to other top universities) is mind-boggling. This thread started out discussing our USNWR ranking for 2011—which is a worthy discussion because the top 3 are usually fixed (Harvard and Princeton flip-flop every few years while Yale appears to be locked at 3) and of the perennial top 6 or 7 schools, Penn, Columbia and MIT are the schools that seem to change positions most often. How it got on the topic of campus aesthetics is beyond me and I really don’t see the relevance, considering that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. </p>
<p>I will not lobby for Penn cause the University speaks for itself. It was my #1 choice over Columbia, Cornell and Northwestern. But while I refuse to lobby for Penn, I also can’t understand why anyone affiliated with the University would feel guilty over our ranking. The notion that Penn doesn’t deserve to be ranked ahead of MIT, Stanford or any other university is ridiculous to me. Who can say they understand the ranking criteria better than those responsible for ranking the schools in the first place? </p>
<p>I haven’t been over to check what the folks from Columbia are saying about their first ever #4 ranking (presumably they are really excited), but if anyone affiliated with Columbia feels guilty that they’ve been ranked ahead of us, Stanford and MIT, then they are shameful representatives of that university imo.</p>
<p>If you ask me, looking at the acceptance rate would be much more reasonable to evaluate College quality/reputation than some newspaper ranking. After all thousands of people made educated choices about their future and where they want to go. The three schools that stand out in the top 15 with low acceptance rates are Upenn, Duke, UChicago, Northwestern John Hopkins and Wash U. Except for UChicago that attracts a very self selective crowd, these schools are all overrated.
Columbia over Stanford and UPenn over MIT, in which universe?
Northwestern and WashU over Brown/Cornell, are you serious?
USWorldNews Rankings are as ridiculous as Forbes or PR Rankings. These rankings just don’t apply to the real world. Why? If you look at the cross admission statistics, almost nobody would choose Upenn over MIT or WashU over Brown, despite their better USWN standing. Upenn does not belong #5 and you guys know it. I agree that Upenn is one of the best Colleges in the world, but the top 5 in the US, that is just too much.</p>
<p>US World News seems like the only legitimate ranking, because they altered their methodology in the 90’s such that the well known schools(HYP) are on top. Any other ranking that doesn’t have them in the top 5(Forbes etc.) seems illegitimate simply because HYP are the most wanted schools, period. However, if you make changes only that people see their presupposed opinion verified it would be much more reasonable to go with the best measure of public opinion- the admission stats.</p>
<p>Acceptance rate as the most meaningful measure of a university’s quality…?</p>
<p>The arithmetic truth is, if Penn had the same class size as Columbia or Princeton, its acceptance rate would be the same as theirs because essentially just as many people apply to Penn as to the other Ivies. There are only so many Ivy applicants in the pool, and I’d speculate that the vast majority of them have access to very good information about their college choices online. So, it’s not really possible that Penn would be able to attract twice as many applicants as Princeton to achieve a similar acceptance rate since those applicants, at least in this country, don’t really exist.</p>
<p>So, your argument is essentially that if Penn made its class size smaller, it would suddenly automatically deserve to be ranked higher than whichever colleges it passed along the way. (Imagine, if Penn’s class size were the same as Dartmouth’s, and assuming the same number of applications and yield rate, Penn’s acceptance rate would magically fall to 6%…lower than Harvard’s! Suddenly, nothing else having changed, we ought to start thinking in terms of PHYP by your reasoning.)</p>
<p>This argument has some implicit merit in the sense that its student:faculty ratio would improve with a smaller class size, but I’m guessing this was not the logical underpinning of your thinking. Your metric for evaluation, then, is pretty much the same as USNews’s new addition: the opinion of the lay public (i.e., high school guidance counselors, or prospective college students) rather than emphasizing any direct measures of educational quality–also a major flaw in the USNWR methodology.</p>
<p>In case the top school’s undergrad programs differ so much in class size looking at cross admission stats might be more reasonable or probably the seize of the overall application pool. I argue that the demand for a Bachelor at a certain school reflects the quality of the school much better than a ranking that has been altered to fit some presupposed opinion and that can be gamed easily.
If you let somebody choose between Stanford and Columbia, cross admissions would easily show what’s the better school. The same applies to WashU and Brown and Penn vs. MIT. </p>
<p>If USWN told people that silver is more valuable than gold, some people might believe. At the end of the day it’s the DEMAND that reflects value and in a society that offers that much information about college programs, the decision of thousands is more reliable than a yearly tabloid statistic.</p>
<p>Penn Alum - I think you are incorrect.</p>
<p>1) You can’t “magically” shrink a class size. Class size affects endowment per student, resources, student/ faculty ratio, percent profs teaching vs. TAs and a host of other factors. If Michigan were Columbia’s size it would be a top 5 as well. The bigger the class the harder it is to maintain quality. Penn does well for a big institution, but its size is an undeniable factor.
2) Size is directly correlated to applicant numbers. Penn has multitudes of programs - a nursing school, business school, large engineering school - all of which attract individual apps that a school like Brown or Dartmouth does not have. If Penn were Dartmouth’s size, it would not have as many applicants.</p>
<p>But, again, whose judgment are you trusting here? The answer: high school students (i.e., 17- and 18-year-olds), their guidance counselors, and the students’ parents. Are these really the experts on whom you’re relying to judge the quality of an institution? Are these people really equipped to evaluate a school’s strengths in various fields of academics? Of course not! They’re probably basing their college decisions in large part based on the impressions they get of a school when (and if) they visit, and also based on their perception of a school’s quality. After all, how is a high school student from Anytown, USA supposed to differentiate between the quality of his or her department of choice at, say, Penn vs. Columbia? Are they going to go through faculty member by faculty member and compare their publications, or do research on the percentage of grants funded at each school? My guess would be a resounding NO. So then we have to ask, what is responsible for ingraining that perception in their minds? I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to consider the possibility that the USNWR rankings and those like them are a large factor in forming an impression of a school in students’ minds. These rankings are pervasive in society–even if we don’t directly reference them, we see their results (i.e., the meme that the Ivies and their ilk are the best) reinforced all over the place, in the media and in personal interactions. Whether Penn is better than Columbia by ranking or reality is immaterial; either way, they’re both Ivy League schools. </p>
<p>So, I agree with your observation that an average high school student will choose Brown over Chicago…but is that what drives the rankings, or is that itself driven by the rankings? And, more to the point, it illustrates just what a flawed metric college choice would be in doing the rankings. The Times (of London) Higher Education Supplement (which uses more objective rankings than USNWR, such as faculty citations, though of course like any ranking still has some problems) ranks the University of Chicago #7 in the world for social sciences (Brown is not even in the top 50), #17 for natural sciences (again, Brown is nowhere to be seen), and #8 for humanities (Brown comes in at #36). So, do you still think that 17-year-old preference is a valid measure of a university, if that university’s chief goal is education/research? So, in this case, USNWR got it right in ranking Chicago well above Brown, although probably as a result of coincidence considering the vastly different ranking criteria. (For the record, THES has Penn at #12 in the world and #8 in the US, after Harvard, Yale, Chicago, Princeton, MIT, Caltech, and Columbia. Stanford comes in at #16.)</p>
<p>Well, there are a whole bunch of institutions whose domestic prestige is much higher than their international prestige, precisely because they have a long history of educating American elites, and because they focus on undergraduate education much more than scholarly production and PhD training. That’s Brown and Dartmouth, and that’s the whole world of LACs that simply don’t exist elsewhere, at least in the West or Asia. Williams and Amherst aren’t even blips on the Times’ HES radar screen, but Forbes is basically willing to argue that they, not HYPS, are the gold standard for undergraduates.</p>
<p>slipper, I didn’t argue that Penn could “magically” shrink its class size; that’s obvious. I was merely illustrating why, from a purely mathematical standpoint, SoWhat?'s argument in favor of using college acceptance rates as a reliable indicator of the quality of the institution is flawed.</p>
<p>And while I agree with you in general that Penn may attract more applicants because of its specialty programs, that doesn’t help to explain why, for example, Brown–whose undergraduate student body is 2/3 the size of Penn’s, received more applicants than Penn this year when it doesn’t have a nursing program or an undergraduate business program. (And to use the miniscule nursing program as a major leg of your argument as to why Penn receives so many more applicants than Dartmouth or Brown does not hold statistical water.) So, size is certainly not directly correlated with applicant numbers when we’re looking at such a small sample as USNWR top 15 or so schools; Brown, Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Stanford…simply too many statistical outliers to signify a meaningful trend.</p>
<p>Also, I believe Michigan deserves to be more highly ranked than it is because of the quality of its academic programs. On the other hand, let’s not give Penn students (or the large numbers of smart kids in general who don’t get into–or don’t choose to attend–smaller Ivies for whatever reason) less than their due by assuming that they’re of lower quality than students at Columbia, Cornell, Brown, or Dartmouth. In spite of its size, Penn’s SAT average is higher than the latter three, and the percentage of Penn students at the tops of their respective high school classes is no lower than the others. Indeed, there are a lot of smart kids in this country/the world.</p>
<p>Also, JHS, indeed I made the point earlier that if quality of undergraduate teaching were the only factor, there would be no reason to rank LACs and universities separately. But, the fact that they do implies that they’re not only looking for small class sizes and faculty with lots of open office hours in making their rankings. And in our general, vague, societal evaluation of schools, we know that we’re not thinking only about those things either; when we think of a school’s quality, we do, I agree, think of the powerful people each school produces, as well as a (stilted) perception of a school’s educational quality as a result. But I’m talking about the quality of scholarship at a school as a way to “rank” them, not merely the perception of prestige.</p>
<p>Oh boy! I guess I should have chosen the college of the ozarks with a 9% acceptance rate over penn because it is obviously better!</p>
<p>Pennalum nailed it btw</p>
<p>
I think the “real world” you were thinking is your high school world. Brown may be more popular among HS kids and has lower admit rate (open curriculum/massive grade inflation help, I guess) but the general consensus among adults (no kids please! :)) is Northwestern has better research and more prominent faculty. Note that despite the admit rate difference, in the end, SAT ranges/class rank are virtually identical. This year, NU is #1 in:
number of Fulbright Scholars
number of Goldwater winners (tied with Rice/MIT)
number of grads sent to Teach for America
I have links to show NU appear to be more well-recruited by BCG/McKinsey if you want but I don’t want to start a whole Brown vs NU thread here. Of course, there will be other data that make Brown appear better. In the end, the two are very much on equal footing.
Maybe you should get more informed and give schools outside of NE more credits. ;)</p>