Ranking vs. Reputation

Applying to College
1

<p>This is a question which has been going around in my head. Are rankings as important as reputations? As a student with an engineering major, I found that universities like Georgia Tech and University of Illinois Urbana Champaign are at the top of the engineering rankings. But universities like Cornell, Princeton, Harvard, Johns Hopkins which have a much better overall reputation are lower ranked for engineering. So which would be better – admission in a higher ranked school or admission in a school with a better reputation? How would it affect my job chances and career?</p>

<p>Thanks for any help.</p>

2

<p>I think that prestige in a particular field is generally much more important than ranking. For instance, Econ at UChicago is generally more respected than Econ at say, Princeton, and so for that field, it would probably be better, future-career-wise, to go to UChicago, even though Princeton is ranked higher. That example, of course, is even more extreme when it comes to the performing arts, where Carnegie Mellon squashes Harvard any day, even though Harvard's ranking is MUCH higher. </p>

<p>Also, individual schools can have relationships with particular businesses; I believe I once heard an example in which Kenyon College always nominated a certain number of kids for a position at a particular company; so for that particular job, it would be better to be at Kenyon than another, higher ranked college.</p>

3

<p>
[quote]
I think that prestige in a particular field is generally much more important than ranking

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I would actually disagree and say that the opposite is true as far as undergrad is concerned: prestige is more important than (departmental) ranking. Why? The truth is, most undergrad students will not end up with jobs related to their major. Think of it this way. Most poli-sci undergrads will never become professional political scientists. Most history undergrads will never become professional historians. And, yes, most econ undergrads - even at UChicago- will never become professional economists. </p>

<p>Even if you do take such a related job after graduation, odds are, you will end up eventually finding yourself in a job that is unrelated. I believe CNN once estimated that the average American changes careers (not just employers, but entire careers) 3 or 4 times in a lifetime. Hence, what does it matter what your departmental ranking is if you're highly likely to someday end up in a career that has nothing to do with that department anyway? Software companies won't know and won't care about the departmental ranking of your English degree. They're just going to notice the general prestige of your school. (I float that example because I know a girl who did precisely that: graduated with a degree in English from an Ivy and then later in her life became a software developer).</p>

4

<p>Good thread. Facing a similar dilemma ...</p>

5

<p>I should also add that very few high school seniors know exactly what they want to major in anyway, and even those who think they know will often times eventually change. That's why most (decent) schools allow students to shop around and switch majors. </p>

<p>Hence, what will happen if you choose a school that is lower-ranked overall than another school but has a higher departmental ranking within a major that you think you like...only to later find out that you don't want to major in that subject anymore? Then you'll probably be wishing that you had chosen that other school. But, unless you can get in as a transfer, you can't go to that other school. You're stuck in the school that you chose.</p>

6

<p>Just a quick question:
McGill vs. VT vs. UIUC vs. UMich for Engineering?</p>

7

<p>20,
I did an analysis last year of the ranking and breadth of the engineering programs as ranked by USNWR. Admittedly, this is a bit crude, but it may be a good start and includes many of the major players in the engineering area. </p>

<p>USNWR ranked 12 areas of study within engineering. I noted whether each school was ranked and what was its rank within that specialty. Below is ranking based on that breadth and the average ranking in those fields:</p>

<p>Rank , # of ranked programs out of 12 possible , Avg Rank in field , College
1 , 10 , 2.90 , MIT
2 , 11 , 4.73 , Stanford
3 , 11 , 5.09 , UC Berkeley
4 , 9 , 5.33 , Ga Tech
5 , 12 , 5.58 , U Illinois
6 , 11 , 5.64 , U Michigan
7 , 9 , 7.78 , Purdue
8 , 8 , 8.63 , Caltech
9 , 11 , 8.82 , Cornell
10 , 9 , 10.00 , U Texas
11 , 7 , 10.57 , Carnegie Mellon
12 , 7 , 11.29 , Princeton
13 , 9 , 12.78 , Northwestern
14 , 9 , 13.11 , U Wisconsin
15 , 11 , 13.45 , Penn State
16 , 5 , 13.60 , U Florida
17 , 8 , 13.63 , Texas A&M
18 , 7 , 14.14 , J Hopkins
19 , 7 , 14.71 , Va Tech
20 , 6 , 16.33 , Duke
21 , 6 , 16.17 , U Washington
22 , 5 , 16.40 , Rice
23 , 6 , 17.00 , UCLA
24 , 5 , 19.80 , USC</p>

8

<p>Nice work there. :)</p>

<p>I've gotten into UIUC, and am confident about getting into GT as well. These two were my "match" schools and I really love GT. But, my GC says I'll also get into McGill(decisions out in a few days), which then changes everything a bit since McGill is only about 25-30k p.a.</p>

<p>:S</p>

9

<p>I'm not sure I understand your cost concern. Here are the costs for the others (acc to USNWR) for tuition and fees:</p>

<p>U Michigan:
IS: $10,341 OOS: $30,154</p>

<p>Georgia Tech
IS: $5234 OOS: $21,348</p>

<p>U Illinois
IS: $10,503 OOS: $23,896</p>

<p>Virginia Tech
IS: $7397 OOS: $19,605</p>

10

<p>Those figures are excluding room and board... McGill is 25-30k total ..</p>

11

<p>Not sure what you are budgeting for room & board, but I would estimate that GT and VT and maybe even UIUC are competitive when all is added together. U Michigan, on the other hand, is probably $10k or more per year more so dropping that one seems logical. You know your own capacity to pay for college, but I would say that a choice on the other colleges and McGill should not come down to differences in cost that are not large. All of GT, UIUC, and VT have terrific engineering programs and should be able to prepare and position you well for postgraduate life.</p>

12

<p>Just looked up the fees again and you're right. The difference really isn't much. Would you say VT, GT and UIUC are better than McGill for Engineering?</p>

13

<p>It depends so much on what you want to do and where you want to work. I went to law school at SMU here in Dallas and work at a Dallas law firm. A degree from UT or SMU puts you in an excellent place if you want to work in Texas...not so much if you want to work in NYC.</p>

<p>You never know who is going to be making the hiring decisions when you are looking for a job. You may have a 4.0 from Yale and lose out to a Texas Tech Red Raider if the person making the hiring decisions is an enthusiastic Tech alum.</p>

<p>A guy I know wanted to go into banking in Ft. Worth, Texas. He found that unless you (a) were born and raised in Ft. Worth, or (b) had a degree from TCU, you couldn't get anywhere in the local banking community. Meeting neither qualification, he went back to school and got a law degree.</p>

14

<p>I was going to wait until after acceptances were in to start a similar thread.....Top in field or better overall school?....Some of you make the argument that a student changes majors/careers so often that better overall school trumps top in field....Anyone want to take the opposite approach?</p>

<p>BTW, I'm not talking about prestige, but rather success, job placement, internships, & alumni contacts</p>

15

<p>"Alumni contacts." Interesting. Here in Dallas, the key to great fortune in the real estate business seems to be to have been a Dallas Cowboy, to have been on the SMU football team, or to have been in a popular frat at SMU. Those guys seem to know everyone and it matters not whether they did well in school.</p>

16

<p>It depends. </p>

<p>A degree from a random school that no one has heard of for UNDERGRADUATE even though it might 'very well respected in the field' is usually useless because when you pursue your masters/phd/mba/jd is when the prestige in the field matters more, because its a concentration. </p>

<p>Let's face it, for undergrad u still only touch the surface topics of your major. The grad school is where you get the real core content to make you an expert in the field. Usually, the undergrad degree is a decoration to get you into grad school or at least make you not look like some guy who never went to college.</p>

17

<p>To 20Legend,</p>

<p>UMich and UIUC are better than McGill for engineering I'd say. They are truly top schools in their fields, even though their rankings are lower than most.</p>

18

<p>Well, uhhhhhhhh. Kind of. </p>

<p>I think that if you went to UMich for psychology graduate school that might, in fact, further your career more than say, Dartmouth. UMich may not be as prestigious as Dartmouth, but if you're going into psychological research, then you want to be prepared as much as possible and UMich would probably do that more than Dartmouth. If you can, try to find a balance of prestige and good rankings (UC Berkeley has some GREAT rankings for engineering AND it's prestigious). </p>

<p>Of course, you shouldn't let "prestige" or "rankings" determine where you go to school. You need to know that atmosphere and like it (considering you'll be spending 4 years there!)</p>

19

<p>
[quote]
I think that if you went to UMich for psychology graduate school that might, in fact, further your career more than say, Dartmouth. UMich may not be as prestigious as Dartmouth, but if you're going into psychological research, then you want to be prepared as much as possible and UMich would probably do that more than Dartmouth

[/quote]
</p>

<p>But again, the presumption there is that you actually want to do psychological research and that you will get a job doing it. Believe me, there are plenty of people who get PhD's in a particular subject who don't end up pursuing it as a career, either because they find something else more interesting to do, or they just can't get a good job in their field. </p>

<p>To give you some examples, consider Franz Boas, one of the most important anthropologists in the history of the field, and who has been called the 'Father of American Anthropology'. His PhD was not in anthropology or any of the other social sciences. It was in physics. He simply became more interested in studying societies than in studying physics. Or consider Peter Naur. His Phd is in astrophysics. But he later became more interested in computer science of which he is now a professor emeritus. In 2005, he won the Turing Award, which is akin to the "Nobel Prize of Computer Science" for his pioneering development of the early Algol 60 programming language, which became the inspiration for many of today's programming languages. </p>

<p>On a more mundane level, there are plenty of people who get PhD's at top-ranked programs but who can't or don't want to stay in their field. As a case in point, I was recently talking to 2 guys who are getting their PhD's in engineering at MIT. Their first choice is to get a tenure-track faculty position at a top engineering school. But they also know that that's unlikely to happen. They can almost certainly get a faculty position at a low-ranked engineering school, but they don't want that. If that's the best they can get, they're going to enter investment banking or management consulting instead. </p>

<p>The point is, you simply never know what life is going to throw at you. Life is unpredictable, and you never know if you're going to get a good job in the field of your choice, nor do you know if your tastes are going to change.</p>

20

<p>So true. My undergrad was very "unselective" in general, but admitted very very few people to my particular major. While I was pursuing that career, people were impressed at where I got my undergrad. But after a career change, my undergrad is no longer impressive in my current field.</p>