The College Confidential Rankings

Applying to College
81

<p>I agree that broad tiers are a much better way to rank colleges than strict numbers are.</p>

<h2>Tier 1</h2>

<p>Amherst
CalTech
Chicago
Columbia
Dartmouth
Duke
Harvard
MIT
Penn
Princeton
Stanford
Swarthmore
Yale
Williams</p>

<h2>Tier 2</h2>

<p>Berkeley
Bowdoin
Brown
Carleton
Carnegie Mellon
Cornell
Emory
Georgetown
Haverford
Johns Hopkins
Middlebury
Notre Dame
Pomona
Rice
Vanderbilt
Villanova
Wellesley
WUStL </p>

<h2>Tier 3</h2>

<p>Brandeis
Bryn Mawr
Case Western
Claremont McKenna
Colgate
Davidson
Georgia Tech
Grinnell
Harvey Mudd
Lehigh
Northwestern
NYU
Tufts<br>
Rochester
UCLA
UCSD
UNC
USC
Vassar
Virginia
Wake Forest
Washington
Washington and Lee
Wesleyan
William and Mary</p>

<h2>Tier 4</h2>

<p>Barnard
Bates
Boston College
Boston U
Bucknell
Colby
Colorado College
Connecticut
George Washington
Florida
Hamilton
Lafayette
Macalester
Maryland
Michigan<br>
Mount Holyoke
Oberlin<br>
Pepperdine
Pittsburgh
Rutgers
Scripps
Smith
Syracuse
Texas
Tulane
UC—Davis
UC—Irvine
UCSB
Washington
Wisconsin
Yeshiva</p>

82

<p>I love Nova, but you're giving it a little too much credit.</p>

83

<p>LOL HMC and NU in the 3rd tier??</p>

84

<p>seriously how are you even coming up with these? WashU (though i love it) should not be a tier above NU/Wesleyan. Notre Dame really shouldn't be tier 2 if Vassar is tier 3. </p>

<p>Since this is basically what you're trying to get at, let's just agree that the top 100 unis and LACs are all good, the top ~50 unis and LACs are excellent, and the top ~20 unis and LACs are the best in the nation. ~ approximates are given so the silly debate will end, and there are exceptions (Reed comes to mind). everybody happy!</p>

85

<h2>Tier 1</h2>

<p>Amherst
CalTech
Chicago
Columbia
Dartmouth
Duke
Harvard
MIT
Penn
Princeton
Stanford
Swarthmore
Yale
Williams</p>

<h2>Tier 2</h2>

<p>Berkeley
Bowdoin
Brown
Carleton
Carnegie Mellon
Cornell
Emory
Georgetown
Haverford
Johns Hopkins
Middlebury
Notre Dame
Pomona
Rice
Villanova
Wellesley
WUStL</p>

<h2>Tier 3</h2>

<p>Brandeis
Bryn Mawr
Case Western
Claremont McKenna
Colgate
Davidson
Georgia Tech
Grinnell
Harvey Mudd
Lehigh
Northwestern
NYU
Tufts
Rochester
UCLA
UCSD
UNC
USC
Vanderbilt
Vassar
Virginia
Wake Forest
Washington
Washington and Lee
Wesleyan
William and Mary</p>

<h2>Tier 4</h2>

<p>Barnard
Bates
Boston College
Boston U
Bucknell
Colby
Colorado College
Connecticut
George Washington
Florida
Hamilton
Lafayette
Macalester
Maryland
Michigan
Mount Holyoke
Oberlin
Pepperdine
Pittsburgh
Rutgers
Scripps
Smith
Syracuse
Texas
Tulane
UC—Davis
UC—Irvine
UCSB
Washington
Wisconsin
Yeshiva</p>

86

<p>As I said, as much as I love Nova, it's academically behind a lot of those schools...</p>

87

<p>Michigan should go in tier 2/3 .. not 4.</p>

88

<p>trizkutt--a good school is more than the average of the undergrad SAT's. UM (and UW) has an outstanding faculty by most measures, is outstanding in research and it has outstanding facilities.(As does UW). They are the second and third best funded for research in the US. (UCLA is #1).</p>

89

<p>parentofivyhope--every Fortune 500 company lists the education of the major officers. It's part of the public record. Wisconsin has lead the list for several years.</p>

90

<p>barrons, can you post a link with a list of colleges ranked by research funding?</p>

91

<p>Here's an interesting comparison of schools. Using this link - <a href="http://chronicle.com/stats/usnews/index.php?category=Universities%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://chronicle.com/stats/usnews/index.php?category=Universities&lt;/a> - I've determined the average ranking for each university and then determined what have been the top 50 unis since USNews started ranking them. As a side note, while many think WashU or Penn are the biggest jumpers in rank, USC actually takes that award.</p>

<ol>
<li>Harvard</li>
<li>Princeton</li>
<li>Yale</li>
<li>Stanford</li>
<li>MIT</li>
<li>Duke</li>
<li>Caltech</li>
<li>Dartmouth</li>
<li>Columbia</li>
<li>UPenn</li>
<li>Chicago</li>
<li>Cornell</li>
<li>Brown</li>
<li>Northwestern</li>
<li>JHU</li>
<li>Rice</li>
<li>WashU</li>
<li>Berkeley</li>
<li>Emory</li>
<li>Notre Dame</li>
<li>Vandy</li>
<li>Virginia</li>
<li>Georgetown</li>
<li>Michigan</li>
<li>CMU</li>
<li>UNC</li>
<li>UCLA</li>
<li>Tufts</li>
<li>Wake Forest</li>
<li>William and Mary</li>
<li>Brandeis</li>
<li>Wisconsin</li>
<li>Rochester</li>
<li>UCSD</li>
<li>NYU</li>
<li>Lehigh</li>
<li>USC</li>
<li>Case Western</li>
<li>UIUC</li>
<li>Boston College</li>
<li>Georgia Tech</li>
<li>Tulane</li>
<li>UC Santa Barbara</li>
<li>UC Irvine</li>
<li>UC David</li>
<li>Yeshiva</li>
<li>University of Washington</li>
<li>Penn State</li>
<li>UT-Austin</li>
<li>RPI</li>
</ol>

<p>I'm actually gonna do this for LACs too...</p>

92

<p>Um, have you read anything in this thread? The point is to come up with our own tierd rankings, not to just average out US News rankings. There a million threads here to discuss US News rankings. Please post this elsewhere.</p>

93

<p>For LACs I only did top 20 b/c it's taxing work:</p>

<ol>
<li>Amherst</li>
<li>Swarthmore</li>
<li>Williams</li>
<li>Wellesley</li>
<li>Pomona</li>
<li>Bowdoin</li>
<li>Carleton</li>
<li>Haverford</li>
<li>Middlebury</li>
<li>Wesleyan</li>
<li>Davidson</li>
<li>Smith</li>
<li>Claremont Mckenna</li>
<li>Grinnell</li>
<li>Bryn Mawr</li>
<li>Vassar</li>
<li>Harvey Mudd</li>
<li>Washington & Lee</li>
<li>Oberlin</li>
<li>Colgate</li>
</ol>

<p>EDIT: Pat, the stuff I've posted is no more useless than the stuff you're typing. At least this has some sort of merit since everyone's list basically resembles USNews anyways. ;)</p>

<p>P.S. - did you read my comments earlier? It's completely cracked out to rank Notre Dame/Villanova in tier 2 and exclude Northwestern, Wesleyan, Virginia, Harvey Mudd, etc.</p>

94

<p>Except that there's probably nobody at least somewhat knowledgeable about higher ed who thinks that USNWR rankings are more than barely useful. Their data is good, but the one-size-fits-all rankings are nonsense.</p>

95

<p>Tier 1 - HYPSM, Columbia, Duke, Dartmouth, Brown, Penn, Northwestern, Chicago</p>

<p>Arguably Georgetown, JHU, Michigan, Berkeley</p>

<p>Thats my opinion of Universities - and pretty much correlates with every ranking/measure out there.</p>

96

<p>Vossron, there's probably nobody at least somewhat knowledgeable about higher ed who respects your personal rankings to a greater degree than USNWR. Brand_182 isn't breaching any rules of etiquette.</p>

97

<p>My point was missed (I didn't make it well): All one-size-fits-all rankings are nonsense, and I have and make no such rankings. The search is about fit, where a given student is best served.</p>

98

<p>brand, I don't understand. In one sentence you gibe everyone for simply copying US News rankings, but in the next you criticize me for going against them.</p>

99

<p>These are supposed to be people's personal rankings, correct? What is the point then if people are just copying USNews with a few mere exceptions.</p>

<p>And I do respect USNews rankings to the extent that they have far more pertinent research (for the prospective undergrad) than other rankings out there (Newsweek, Washington, etc.)</p>

100

<p>im not trying to be a naive lyoung poster or anything but it all comes down to this:</p>

<p>who cares?</p>

<p>Is it that important to make rankings... people should choose colleges based on visits, the education based on their career, etc.
I think its hilarious that ppl put admission rate as a factor!
Does it matter that one college accepts only 8% and one accepts 27%? </p>

<p>Seriously this doesnt really matter</p>