<p>Does anyone have any idea as to how these are ranked? I am very curious as to why a school such as Wake Forest, can finish #23 in the US News but fall all the way down to #180 in the Times rankings. The only schools who consistently rank in the top, outside of ivy leagues, MIT and Cal Tech, seem to be Michigan, Penn State, UCLA and UIUC so I'm guessing a category such as resources weighs heavily since these are massive schools and smaller schools, like Wake and even Emory, fall way below the rankings. </p>
<p>All 3 use completely different methodologies. USNWR emphasizes reputation, resources, grad rate, and selectivity. QS emphasizes reputation, research, and student-faculty ratio. Times emphasizes research and teaching (largely measured by reputation). There are also differences in the sources of reputation, particularly for US sources vs world sources. Also note that world rankings are expected to be higher than national rankings since many colleges outside of the US are ranked well. For example, if 2/3 the spots above #180 are outside of the US, then it’s US ranking would be ~60.</p>
<p>Regarding Wake Forest, Times only has it ranked well in citations. It is ranked particularly poorly in research and international outlook. QS ranks it extremely poorly in academic reputation (only 10/100) and international measures. I can’t see the USNWR ranking criteria measures because I am not a subscriber, but the text mentions an excellent reputation, so the reputation difference may largely relate to measures of reputation in the US vs measures of reputation in the world.</p>
<p>In short, the ranking measures all have different criteria, and none of them likely are appropriate for you. I’d recommend focusing on whatever criteria is important for you, rather than how a 3rd party arbitrarily ranks them.</p>
<p>Thanks for the input, guys. I just found the disparity to be very confusing, like how UMass was ranked higher on a reputation list than both USC and UNC</p>