<p>Sadly, Google reveals that the word “prestigiosity” existed before I coined it in this context.</p>
<p>@dividerofzero </p>
<p>Remember, math is based on logic. It allows you to use real numbers to describe imaginary things and imaginary numbers to describe real things. If math weren’t so logical, we would probably have trouble convincing kids to study math related subjects in college.</p>
<p>On the positive side, Google located an article which provides strong evidence that “prestigiosity” is not only real, but linked to Harvard. </p>
<p>This should serve to boost the credibility of Hunt’s ranking among doubters…</p>
<p><a href=“The Harvard Crimson”>http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2009/3/18/blocking-it-defines-you-forever-freshmen/</a></p>
<p>I’d like to see your next ranking project be ranking colleges by how upset their boosters get about their prestigiosity rankings, believing that they have been unfairly understated and need to be corrected. </p>
<p>Well, based on posts in this thread, these schools came up at least once as underrated in the venerable prestigiosity ranking:</p>
<p>Berkeley
Brown
Carnegie Mellon
Chicago (I’m certainly guilty)
Cornell
Duke
Emory
MIT*
Michigan
Penn (esp. by separating Wharton)
Stanford*</p>
<p>*Yes, I’m surprised too.</p>
<p>Thanks, but Hunt is the definitive judge on this. </p>
<p>@Hunt,</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I think you should give schools bonus prestigiosity points if students continue to wear the souvenir shirts they bought on the school’s tour, even after they get rejected by the school. </p>
<p>Also, **UPenn<a href=“sans%20Wharton%20name”>/b</a> is being rated waaaay too high on the milliHYPe scale. I propose that it be weighted for being confused all the time w Penn State. I think this straightforward weighting methodology will withstand critical peer review:</p>
<p>Raw milliHYPe:
University of Pennsylvania 974.5295798
Pennsylvania State University - University Park 807.7960146</p>
<p>Weighted milliHYPe:
(90% x UPenn) + (10% x PennState)
= (90% x 974.5295798) + (10% x 807.7960146)
= 957.8562233</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>A weighted milliHYPe of 957.8562233 would sink Penn below it’s Ivy compadre, Dartmouth, but keep it a hair above Cornell.</p>
<p>I’ve never seen anybody on CC confuse Penn and Penn State. What others think doesn’t matter for prestigiosity.</p>
<p>where do you rank Madison and Boston College? Madison is popular as a “almost” michigan (i leave my personal opinions about it out) in the midwest at least while Boston College seems to be bumped up a bit due to its location</p>
<p>@Hunt But everyone on CC is dreadfully aware of how often Penn is confused with Penn State. Since prestigiosity is pretty consistent with how much lay prestige CC-ers think a university has, I’d say the weighting method was valid.</p>
<p>Please explain how state universities can have prestigiosity. And Wellesley should be about Brown and definitely higher than Vandy</p>
<p>@Evergreen1929 Not sure if you’re taking this seriously, but since you seem to be referring to the ranking with a lot of decimal points:</p>
<p>My pseudoscientific methodology gave 50% weightage to the % of a school’s student body that consists of National Merit Scholars (2013) and 50% to the % of a school’s student body that consists of National Achievement Scholars (2013). This excluded college-sponsored Scholars for what I hope are obvious reasons. This meant that Liberal Arts Colleges got downgraded pretty significantly because National Merit Scholars have an even stronger bias for National Universities than the average student body (but then again, does Williams really have the same level of prestigiosity as Harvard?). Since people (<em>surprise</em>) actually go to state universities, they’re on the list. And Brown is a bit inflated because it’s got a very high number of Achievement Scholars relative to Merit Scholars- and Achievement Scholars individually count more than Merit Scholars but tend to be better represented in National Universities than Liberal Arts Colleges (after all, it’s a bit telling that the top four LACs are represented by the acronym “WASP”). I could refine the methodology if you like- 50% based on % of students that are Merit and Achievement Scholars and 50% based on a school’s Scholars as a percentage of the whole. This was just a BS extrapolation from other data and I wanted to see how well this would line up with the previous rankings.</p>
<p>Oh you make me laugh. As an old achievement scholar, it’s good to know we count for more. Maybe I was using the snoberosity scale. Totally different.</p>
<p>All the angst in the non-winner part of Penn is the result of confusion between prestigiosity and prestige, not the result of any confusion between Penn and Penn State. </p>
<p>I may be dating myself, but before the advent of social media, to approximate the notion of prestigiosity, one had to attempt to count the number of people associated with a university/college that talked like this:</p>
<p><a href=“A dying race- two Boston Brahmins converse - American Tongues Episode #8 - YouTube”>A dying race- two Boston Brahmins converse - American Tongues Episode #8 - YouTube;
<p>
You begin to comprehend, grasshopper.</p>
<p>@Hunt I think ND should have a ranking in parenthesis for Catholics. It’s the holy grail in the Midwest at least</p>
<p>
This may well be true, but I don’t see that expressed very often on CC, which is the test of prestigiosity.</p>
<p>Any ideas when we can expect an updated ranking @Hunt hahahaha</p>