<p>TheThoughtProcess, there are two camps out there...those who believe that undergraduate and graduate excellence are unrelated and those who believe that they are somewhat related. I personally think they are related. To me, the quality of the curriculum and faculty matters. Others don't care as much about what they are learning or who is teaching them, but rather, want to compete with other students and get close to their professors. It depends on one's preference.</p>
<p>"I personally think they(undergrad and grad programs) are related. To me, the quality of the curriculum and faculty matters. "</p>
<p>I agree with this statement - that's why Columbia, UChicago, and Harvard are the top 3 universities which produced most Nobel Prize winners from their undergrad college. These 3 universities have huge graduate programs. Among these three, Columbia and UChicago have core curriculum and they produced the most and the second most Nobel Prize winners.</p>
<p>joshua007,
Re this thread and your comments on the connection between undergrad and grad schools, please review the list in the opening post. Brown is the number one school and Smith, Pomona, Pitzer, and Swarthmore are in the top 12. None of these are renown for their strong graduate programs. </p>
<p>Six of the top ten schools do not break out their undergrads from their graduate students. I continue to believe that the results of a school's undergraduates should not be confused with those of its graduate students. I believe that you are making a link that, in many, many cases, does not exist. Furthermore, I repeat that I believe that this type of scholarship is an ineffective barometer to use in evaluating any university. Jack's comments above a perfect reason why. </p>
<p>Re the comments that I have made elsewhere re U Michigan, I have tried to provide a great deal of supporting data and commentary for my position. I continue to believe that U Michigan is an excellent state university that would rank in the top 30 or 40 colleges nationally. Other than a lot of research grant data that is mostly tied to the graduate programs at U Michigan, I have found little evidence to support a different conclusion. </p>
<p>As a non-American (with an interest in engineering and/or life sciences, right?), your perspective is understandable as U Michigan (and particularly its graduate programs), like several other large US universities, have strong technical research efforts that gives them a prominence among academics in these fields. Good for them. But you must understand that there are many very, very good colleges in America with a great breadth of superior students and eminent academic programs, including beyond the technical areas. </p>
<p>I urge you to look again at the quality of the students and the schools that rank in the USNWR Top 40. I have great respect for these students and for the schools that they attend. There truly are many exceptional schools in that universe that measure exceedingly well on a great variety of quantifiable benchmarks that serve to distill the hype from the reality. IMO, the large majority of those schools provide a superior undergraduate education than does U Michigan and I believe that the facts support my conclusion.</p>
<p>Total # Fulbright Scholars over the past 6 years from Top Private Universities (what I consider top 15 or so privates, feel free to add more schools):</p>
<p>Columbia - 130
Harvard - 130
Yale - 115
Brown - 115
Duke - 110
Stanford - 110
Penn - 95
Princeton - 95
Chicago - 80
Cornell - 80
Northwestern - 75
JHU - 70
Dartmouth - 45
Georgetown - 45
MIT - 20</p>
<p>Notes:
- I rounded to the nearest 5.
- Schools near the top that had it broken down by undergrad and grad on the list were Harvard, Columbia, and Brown. In some years, Columbia had more than half from grad programs.
- The highest schools outside of the Northeast are Stanford and Duke, then Chicago and Northwestern
- Per Capita would not change these results significantly, as most of these student bodies are in the range of 1300 - 1700 per year (Penn is the largest, with over 2000).</p>
<p>Also - I realize people often stress the importance of having Nobel Prize winners.</p>
<p>The average age of a Nobel prize winner is about 65 over the past decade or so. That means that the winner attended undergraduate school in about 1965. Universities have changed alot since 1965.</p>
<p>However, more Nobel Prize winners have come from the Fulbright program than any other academic program in the world - thus, Fulbright winners over this past decade is probably a better indicator of future Nobel Prizes rather than Nobel Prizes already given out...if that makes any sense.</p>
<p>Actually most of the top schools are pretty much the same. Very few changes to the Top 25 ot Top 50. Some move up or down but they are still all there. Maybe 5 schools have actually moved in or out.</p>
<p>I'd think Nobel Prize is far more important than Fulbright.</p>
<p>And let's see your "indicator" thing. I bet MIT won't produce the least Nobel Prize winners in the future in your list of top Universities.</p>
<p>Guess not as many people care about studying in a foreign county, at least for kids in MIT - the smartest group of kids.</p>
<p>Biztogo: You missed my point. I think the Nobel Prize is much more important than the Fulbright. I'm saying that Fulbright's given out in the past decade might be a better indicator of future performance in Nobel Prizes, rather than Nobel Prize winners from institutions over the past several decades. The reason: Nobel Prize winners today went to undergrad around the 1960s - four decades ago. Fulbright scholars are current students. </p>
<p>More Nobel Prize winners come from Fulbright backgrounds than any other academic program, so if this relationship holds true in the future (which it might, who knows), Fulbrights over the past decade might be a solid indicator of how well an institution does in producing Nobel Prize winners around the 2030's. Just food for thought.</p>
<p>MIT will probably still dominate - I'm not saying it won't. But the number of Fulbrights is still one of many things one could look at when gauging school strength. Word. I also don't think MIT kids are the smartest group of students (though I don't think any one student body could be considered that).</p>
<p>thethoughtprocess:I guess Fulbright is just an international education program which lays a great deal of emphasis on exchange of cultures and languages. That may or may not be related to Nobel Prize or other great academic achievements.</p>
<p>Sorry, I should have said that MIT students are among the smartest group of kids. I say that for a fact. Every body knows.</p>
<p>
[quote]
there are two camps out there...those who believe that undergraduate and graduate excellence are unrelated and those who believe that they are somewhat related.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Actually, there are other camps out there (such as myself) who believe that there are varying degrees of "gray" in the graduate / undergraduate quality debate.</p>
<p>First, let us agree that not all universities / colleges are alike. There are the traditional LACs with little to no emphasis on grad programs. There are LAC-like universities with the majority of emphasis on undergraduate programs (e.g. Princeton, Brown, Dartmouth) over grad programs. And finally the full blown research universities (e.g. Harvard, Yale, Stanford, the state unis).</p>
<p>Within that mix, there are schools that excel in providing a top notch undergraduate education regardless of its emphasis (e.g. Amherst, Williams, HYPSM, the other Ivies, Duke)</p>
<p>Looking beyond that initial level of analysis, there are universities that provide solid undergraduate experiences but relatively weaker graduate school experiences (e.g. Brown, Dartmouth, Duke come to mind).</p>
<p>There are universities that provide relatively stronger graduate school experiences / quality vs. undergrad (e.g. Michigan and Cal)</p>
<p>And then there are those universities that excel in providing first-class undergrad AND grad experiences (e.g. HYPSM).</p>
<p>Simply put, its not a simple case of undergrad / grad excellence being "unrelated" per se, but that certain institutions may be stronger in one area vs. another (with relative degrees of strengths and weaknesses across that spectrum). The issue that has been the point of contention in the past has been instances where a relative strength (be it in grad programs or otherwise) is used as a proxy for overall strength or strengths in areas where it isn't merited.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Fulbright scholars are current students.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, that's what this particular thread is all about, but the Fulbright Program also awards hundreds of faculty and/or professionals in their field every year. That's why I suggested that maybe looking at the number of Fulbrights among the faculty at these universities might also be (more?) illuminating.</p>
<p>Jack, good idea, I will search some school websites to see if that is mentioned anywhere.</p>
<p>The only problem with that might be the difficulty of gathering accurate data since I feel that may not be compiled in the same way as student awards.</p>
<p>Fullbright leaders over the last 10 years (1997-2006):</p>
<h1>1 Harvard University (248)</h1>
<h1>2 UC-Berkeley (217)</h1>
<h1>3 Columbia University (202)</h1>
<h1>4 University of Michigan (197)</h1>
<h1>5 Yale University (190)</h1>
<h1>6 Stanford University (181)</h1>
<h1>7 Brown University (175)</h1>
<h1>8 Princeton University (160)</h1>
<h1>9 Duke University (153)</h1>
<h1>10 University of Wisconsin-Madison (152)</h1>
<h1>11 UC-Los Angeles (149)</h1>
<h1>12 University of Pennsylvania (140)</h1>
<h1>13 University of Chicago (127)</h1>
<h1>14 Cornell University (121)</h1>
<h1>15 University of Texas-Austin (120)</h1>
<p>No other university produced more than 100 Fulbright winners.</p>
<p>I think that the_prestige's nuanced explanation above of the relationship of undergraduate/graduate students to school reputation is generaly accurate. In particular, I point to his closing comment,</p>
<p>"the point of contention in the past has been instances where a relative strength (be it in grad programs or otherwise) is used as a proxy for overall strength or strengths in areas where it isn't merited."</p>
<p>I believe that the_prestige has hit the nail squarely on the head.</p>
<p>Thanks Alexandre, that is a very useful compilation.</p>
<p>Nor should a strength be demoted to a weakness for no substantive reason. The presumption that being strong at the grad level somehow indicates that the undergrad will be weaker is unfounded and unproven.</p>
<p>Good point, barrons.</p>
<p>Barrons, that is absolutely true. It is ridiculous to argue, as many implicitly do, that strength in graduate programs is unrelated to undergraduate education quality. Such an argument is often a solipsistic effort to excuse the poor quality of a favored school. </p>
<p>Alexandre, a very helpful list, as it cuts across the humanities and sciences.</p>
<p>redcrimble,
"solipsistic" Great word. Major Scrabble points for you. :) However, I don't fully understand your comment on the question of the relationship between graduate and undergraduate students. All of the disagreements that I have seen on this topic relate to posters from schools with strong graduate programs who insist that the grad school reputation trump all measurements of undergraduate studies and undergraduate students (who might be of a lower quality) and that the undergraduate status be automatically accepted at the same level as the graduate program. Is this the solipsism that you refer to?</p>
<p>Hawkette (and thanks for the inquiry), point is that some seem improvidently to discount relationship of quality between graduate and undergraduate departments, almost to the point that the argument (illogically) that there is either a null or even inverse relationship. School A is a major research university with an excellent Philosophy department premised on standing of graduate school, ergo, teaching must be mediocre in same (or other) courses of study. In fact, quality of teaching enhanced by intellectual depth and standing of one's college's field of study. That does not mean that you will get a terrific teacher, but it certainly makes it more likely, not less so.</p>
<p>Way too much emphasis, I believe as well, on class size. I have had great teachers in large classes and terrible ones in small classes. Certainly, there can be excellent teachers at lesser schools, but it is concomitantly less likely. Irrational, too, the notion that smaller colleges will have better teachers than larger ones. It is not even correlative, much less causative.</p>