<p>Interesteddad: You make two interesting points. I'm not sure where the point about endowment size leads, though. </p>
<p>How does it assist a student's analysis to know that a particular school may do well in the rankings at least in part because of the size of its endowment? Are we to assume that the rankings of a school with a high endowment are artificially enhanced because of the cost-price disparity you reference -- and therefore discount some of the enhanced ranking? Or are we to assume that a high ranking caused by a large endowment might actually translate into a better fit for at least some students (because the school, with its endowment, can purchase teachers, facilities, etc. that might improve the fit)? Or nether?</p>
<p>Well, each family obviously has their own criteria for looking into colleges. What is important to one is not important to another. </p>
<p>My kids had a ranking....this is what it was: favorite to least favorite (some tied). Many personal criteria went into it and selectivity or which was known as a really good school was one of the factors. Worked for us. Nobody analyzed all these figures. Just the admit rate and qualifications needed to get in. The rest was exploring the school itself....be it programs, location, kinds of students, size, extracurricular opportunities in their interest areas, the department they were considering, and other general feel of campus, etc. It wasn't rocket science. They didn't examine all these figures and numbers. Now that they are in college, I can't begin to tell how HAPPY they are with every single aspect of the school they picked and how it feels like such a great fit. That's all I wanted as a parent. I didn't care where they went as long as this was the result and it couldn't be better. And in the end, they actually did end up at selective schools that have a very good reputation. Where they rank on some list, I am not sure but they are known as very good schools and yes, that was one of their criteria, but not the only one.</p>
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<p>You cannot look at Supreme Court Justices to see where they went to school because in the days they went to school, it was not that difficult to go to an Ivy League School!<<</p>
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<p>Ivy league schools were prestigous back then, and they are prestigous now. My point has nothing to do with how hard or easy Ivy league schools are to gain admission to then vs. now -- it is that an Ivy or other top school diploma is an obvious but unspoken job requirement in order to get on the Supreme Court. So when someone asks, "Does prestige matter?", the answer is "It depends". Mostly it doesn't, but for a few select career paths (and there are other examples besides the Supreme Court), it does.</p>
<p>Actually, Xiggi, I meant "inconsonant; lacking harmony of parts." You correctly note that the relative degree of "liberalism" is in the eye of the beholder but in the next breath presume that the "slant of the yardstick" you employ is valid and objective. Sorry, but you are no more able to fully correct for the bias injected into your own perception than the students at Bob Jones U. or the Che Guevara School of Granola. Between swiftboating, "wedge issues", and "all politics are local" (not to mention the fact that Gore got more votes than Bush in 2000) do you honestly think thta the outcome of an election, or a group of elections, actually identifies the objective center of the "liberal-conservative" spectrum of anything? </p>
<p>The average University population is more likely to have a high percentage of believers in evolution, and fewer adherents of Creationism than is true for the rest of the country as well. Does that make Universities "off center" on that issue? Where is the "center"?</p>
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I'm not sure where the point about endowment size leads, though.
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<p>There was some talk earlier in the thread about all the different "ranking" systems and different formulae that are used. I was merely pointing out that the common (usually unstated) factor in ALL of the ranking/prestige lists is endowment size. </p>
<p>The schools that are near the top of the various lists are at the top because they have the most money and have had the most money for the longest time. There's no magic fairy dust. Just follow the money. Facilities, faculty, programs, diversity, financial aid, you name it. They all require spending. It takes a lot of the mystique out of it, but much of understanding colleges derives directly from the underlying economics.</p>
<p>Now, whether or not a school spends its money on stuff that benefits a particular student is another (and important) issue, but that's largely independent of rankings. That's where "the fit" comes in.</p>
<p>You can cut through a lot of the fog of the various rating systems by simply looking at per student endowment.>></p>
<p>Another measure to look at is Educational Expenditures Per full Time Student. It is not a perfect measure (works best for LACs), but it does give you something to compare among schools. Obviously, one would need to keep geographic cost differences in the back of one's mind, but comparable schools (in terms of selectivity) spending vastly different amounts on Educational Expenditures does raise a red flag for me. One quick source for finding them is the US Government collected info database, which I tend to trust a little more than the common data set information: </p>
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From #19, above: "I think there are two career paths where the ranking/prestige of your school (and/or especially grad school) can often make a significant difference: 1. Prominent government positions, and 2. Academic positions at high end universities and research institutes."
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Neither of these generalizations is quite right. Prestige or quality of your undergrad school makes no difference whatsoever in obtaining an academic position at a "high end" university or research institute. However, the prestige and especially the quality of your graduate program does matter -- a lot. In virtually any job for which some sort of advanced degree is a qualification, the quality (and prestige) of the program from which that terminal degree was earned is what matters, whether it's a JD, PhD, MBA or some other degree.</p>