<p>Many people, including myself, often overlook small Liberal Arts Colleges because they are blinded by the Ivies and other top universities. People who know colleges also know the benefits of LACs but there are many who are ignorant of these smaller schools. I would like to see LACs placed on the same list as top national universities to make it easier to compare them with other schools and also so that people can give them the credit that they deserve. I would also be interested to see how the LAC top 25 schools rank against the USNews top 25 national schools. It would be interesting, but is it a good idea or is it better that they are separated?</p>
<p>Those who see the merit in a smaller, more personalized environment will know the LACs are out there. While I agree wholeheartedly with your point, it would be difficult to collectively rank these apples and plums. :)</p>
<p>While this list isn't perfect, it does give a good relative sense of comparing large schools and smaller schools.</p>
<p>That ranking seems very biased against the South. Washington and Lee is a top 50 school.</p>
<p>comparing LACs to Unis would be like comparing Art schools to Tech schools. cant do it.</p>
<p>I don't think it is wise to rank LACs and research universities together. They offer very different types of educations and what constitues a strength in one will generally be a weakness at the other. I think it is always best to first decide what sort of education/college or university one wants, and then, to pick schools based on that preference.</p>
<p>I would prefer to see them ranked together.</p>
<p>People already need to sort within the lists to find colleges that meet their tastes. For example, a prospective undergraduate business student who is going through the top universities list would need to figure out which schools do not offer undergraduate business majors and cross them off the list. Similarly, people who are not interested in LACs could cross them off, too.</p>
<p>The problem with two separate lists, as I see it, is that there's no way to compare the quality/reputation of a school on one list with that of a school on the other list. Is the 25th LAC roughly equivalent in quality to the 25th university or the 50th or some other number? Who knows?</p>
<p>The major problem for me is that certain schools are, in my opinion, misclassified. For example, let's be honest, Dartmouth, Brown, and Princeton are basically LAC's that just happen to have graduate programs. But the fact is, a school like Dartmouth shares far far more in common with Williams or Amherst than it does with a huge research university like Berkeley or Michigan. Furthermore, some schools that are classified as LAC's have extensive graduate programs. For example, Bryn Mawr is classified as a LAC but offers a number of PhD programs. In fact, one of Bryn Mawr's claims to fame is that it was the first women's college to offer graduate degrees, including PhD's. Yet it is classified as a LAC anyway. </p>
<p>Hence, you already get the mass confusion of people claiming that Berkeley is "better" or "worse" than Dartmouth based on departmental strength or lack thereof, yet these same people hesitate to make comparisons between Berkeley and Williams. The better conclusion to draw would be that Berkeley and Dartmouth are different, not inherently better or worse than each other. If Dartmouth was properly classified as a LAC, then people would have to stop and think about what it really means to go to a LAC vs. a research university.</p>
<p>The same is true for William and Mary (which really should be a LAC). </p>
<p>To answer the thread question: No, LACs should be separate from National Universities.</p>
<p>For an overall ranking of quality, no, I don't think LACs and Universities should be in the same list. Their strengths are different. I don't think you can find one good set of criteria that places LACs and Universities on an equal footing.</p>
<p>There might be some specific criteria on the basis of which both LACs and Universities can be fairly compared, such as SATs, High School Ranks and others. Maybe peer assessment by their respective peer institutions. Not many such criteria, though.</p>
<p>One can certainly compare the stats of incoming students on one list.
This is an indication of the average level of the "inputs", which can be relevant information. It says nothing about how they are improved by the schools themselves though.</p>
<p>An employer or grad/professional school might want to view the achievements of various applicants by reference to the various peer groups they were "competing against". Just as colleges consider the academic strength of an applicant's high school class. An input comparison may be relevant for this purpose, and is relatively easy to do.</p>
<p>An "output" comparison might be even more relevant if it existed; however there is no standardized measure that all graduates take.</p>