I’ve noticed that Binghamton has gotten hit pretty hard in rankings lately, especially the SOM. Anybody know why?
A decades old reputation of Harpur College impacted ratings until recently and way after it wasn’t really like that. People who don’t know the school well probably visualized Harpur College as they rated it. But it has changed markedly and is not longer a small liberal arts school with a favorable faculty student ratio and top NY students. It is now a medium sized public institution with mostly large classes and with an administration whose priority is shuffling as many students through as quickly as possible. That isn’t a bad thing-it retains students and gets them out quickly. Since these changes, there was a serious of scandals that highlighted how far today’s Binghamton U was from the Harpur of old. I think that became very public when the scandals were publicized. It is still a decent medium sized state university that has a lot to offer.
In my experience of comparing one state school to another, Binghamton has been significantly more proactive preparing students for careers, their alumni base in NYC is rather extensive. My sophomore has been given many more opportunities and career prep/seminars/networking events than my other OOS public kid got as a engineering major.
Samiamy, Which OOS are you referring to? I’ve noted quite the opposite for engineering when compared to Michigan, Georgia Tech, and Virginia Tech although the opportunities have been national-not always NY.
They may have changed the criteria for rankings. Maybe before they placed a lot of emphasis on the grades and SAT scores of the incoming class. Now maybe they weigh the opinions of guidance counselors and other college administrators which is binghamton’s weakness since it doesn’t have much of a reputation outside of parts of new york. I believe they also look at a schools endowment which binghamton doesn’t have much of, since it is a relatively young state school. However, SoM is a great choice for an instate student, especially if they are interested in accounting.
I don’t believe the factors that make up the rankings have changed much. I think only the rankings themselves changed. Check them out. No one ranking system is ideal so you should look at a range of them.
From a report released last week…
"Binghamton University, one of the State University of New York’s four university centers, is the top public four-year college in New York, according to a report out today.
Among the 484 colleges ranked across the nation, Binghamton, located in New York’s Southern Tier, placed at No. 18.
Three other SUNY schools, Stony Brook University, Geneseo and the University at Buffalo, cracked the top 50 list, at No. 32, No. 35 and No. 47, respectively."
http://www.bizjournals.com/albany/news/2015/02/12/the-best-public-colleges-in-new-york.html?ana=twt
Read about the factors that contribute to rankings. The Business Journal rankings seem out of sync with other rankings. I guess that means that they are not redundant with the other rankings.