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<p>With the possible exceptions of Northwestern and Duke, all of these “peer institutions” are much more selective than Rice:</p>
<p>Yield/Admit Rate , College , Yield , Admit Rate</p>
<p>9.57 , Harvard , 76% , 7.9%
7.90 , Yale , 68% , 8.6%
7.48 , Stanford , 71% , 9.5%
5.90 , Princeton , 59% , 9.9%
4.00 , Brown , 55% , 13.7%
3.65 , Dartmouth , 49% , 13.5%
1.52 , Rice , 35% , 23.0%</p>
<p>A school isn’t a better school because it has a lower or higher yield. Nor is it a better school because it admits fewer or more students. And it’s just silly to even debate this issue. <em>bowing out now</em></p>
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<p>Perhaps. But there’s a general consensus in the international community about Rice’s place in the hierarchy of higher education: </p>
<p>[THE</a> - QS World University Rankings 2009 - top universities | Top Universities](<a href=“http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university-rankings/2009/results]THE”>http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university-rankings/2009/results)</p>
<p>1 HARVARD University United States
2 University of CAMBRIDGE United Kingdom
3 YALE University United States
4 UCL (University College London) United Kingdom
5= IMPERIAL College London United Kingdom
5= University of OXFORD United Kingdom
7 University of CHICAGO United States
8 PRINCETON University United States
9 Massachusetts Institute of Technology United States
10 California Institute of Technology United States
…
100 RICE University United States</p>
<p>FWIW, “LAC-like schools, like Dartmouth and Brown, and schools like Duke and Northwestern” are all ranked above Rice.</p>
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<p>Agreed. Here is a prime example:</p>
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<p>dimsum123:</p>
<p>Why don’t you stop dancing around, picking holes in other people’s opinions and offer your own honest-to-goodness opinion: Which colleges would you say are Rice’s peers?</p>
<p>We’re all dying to know. Do tell.</p>
<p>I would say the ff schools are the peer schools of Rice:</p>
<p>WUStL, Northwestern, Berkeley, Emory, Vanderbilt, Michigan, Notre Dame, Cornell, CMU, UVa and JHU</p>
<p>Rankings of institutions have nothing to do with being “peer” institutions. </p>
<p>A loose definition would be that “peer schools” compete with each other for the same students. Now, a student who is accepted at Harvard might also be accepted at Illinois, but another student who can get accepted at Illinois may not get into Harvard. Illinois and Harvard do not compete with each other for ALL students that apply to either school.</p>
<p>Rice competes directly with: half of the Ivies, Stanford, Northwestern, Duke, Texas at Austin, (Plan II Honors Program), Texas A&M (Engineering), Johns Hopkins, Vanderbilt, and Tulane.</p>
<p>Disregarding rankings but regarding Rice’s culture–size, politics, access to prof., admin. support, freshmen retention rate, campus aesthetic, the LAC-cum-university feel, access to a major city–Rice is akin to Emory, Tufts, Northwestern, and Wash U. And similar to Yale as far as its residential housing. I think the colleges I mentioned as comparable to Rice have much stronger focus on and support for their undergrads than many of the “top” schools, listed above.</p>
<p>Dimsum, you sound molto unhappy. I feel sorry for you. Really.</p>
<p>And to whoever posted that Dimsum was possibly Interestingguy, the same occurred to me because of the woefully mean-spirited and angry sensibility that shines through their every posting.</p>
<p>People with good self-esteem simply don’t post posts like Dim or Interesting.</p>
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<p>I feel sorry for the self-righteous. Really .</p>
<p>There is zero doubt that Rice in a great school. Posters like dimsum are welcome to their opinions, and can use irrelevant lists to try and make some kind of a point. Is Rice one of the more famous schools? No, it is small and undergraduate focused, and thus will never be as high on some “opinion poll” list as some other schools. Is the average SAT over 2100, making it one of the schools with really really smart kids? Yes, it is and it does. So if going to a “famous” school is important to you, there are more famous schools than Rice. If going to a school with high quality fellow students, great faculty, amazing campus in a large city with lots to do, and other desireable traits is important to you, consider Rice. It is as simple as that.</p>
<p>The OP did the same post with 6 or so other schools, most of them peers to Rice, lol. I seem to recall there are places where you can see the schools that Rice students most often applied to also. Over thousands of students, the ones most frequently cited would be the peers. By seeing those accumulate as compared to safeties and State U’s, which will vary more (with the possible exception of UT since a lot of Texas residents apply to Rice), one would know what schools applicants feel are peer institutions. Pretty simple.</p>
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<p>WHEATon, CORNell</p>
<p>^… just wow.</p>
<p>^^^ Nice summary by fallenchemist.</p>
<p>Rice is about as good as it gets but some would agree that Harvard, Yale and Dartmouth have pretty good reputations as well. (especially those on the East coast). Just because they are lower ranked should not keep you from considering them if you really would rather go to a school in New England. It’s all about fit!</p>
<p>[Top</a> 2000 Ranked Universities for Highest Overall School Score](<a href=“USA University College Directory - U.S. University Directory - State Universities and College Rankings”>http://www.stateuniversity.com/rank/score_rank.html)</p>
<p>Cornell is about as good as it gets but some would agree that Rice has a pretty good reputation as well (especially to those in Texas). Just because it is lower ranked should not keep you from considering it if you really would rather go to a school in Houston. It’s all about fit!</p>
<p>[Top</a> 2000 Ranked Universities for Highest Overall School Score](<a href=“USA University College Directory - U.S. University Directory - State Universities and College Rankings”>http://www.stateuniversity.com/rank/score_rank.html)</p>
<p>Haha, dimsum, I enjoy reading your posts and agree with many of them. It’s unfortunate you’re posting on the Rice board though, where people are more likely to defend Rice at all costs.</p>
<p>By the way, the hyperlinked rankings are some of the worst I’ve seen.</p>
<p>All these numbers, lists, etc are completely useless. Each school offers something different and this cannot be quantified and neatly organized in some sort of list. Some schools are better in engineering, some are better in business. For example, USC has one of the top engineering programs in the nation, even better than a lot of the Ivy’s, but these lists people rely on don’t say that. </p>
<p>What is the point of these numbers and lists? People need to sit down and really think about how these schools are ranked and the biases clearly expressed by the individuals who do these lists. I really feel bad for the kids who apply to schools based on a “ranking”. I hear it all the time, this school is ranked that, that school is ranked this. It is getting ridiculous and shows that kids are applying to schools for the wrong reason. Honestly I could care less what Rice’s peers are. All I know is I really want to attend this school because of its location, its small size, yet big school atmosphere because of Houston, and its opportunities because of its affiliation with NASA and The Texas Medical Center. These are real reasons for attending a school. And to answer your question OP, there is no peer to Rice. No school can boast that they are affiliated and righ tnext to the biggest medical center in the world.</p>
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<p>Unfortunately, Rice cannot boast about having its own medical school.</p>
<p>People are far better off ignoring posters like dimsum. It would be useful to learn that.</p>