Top Ten most Prestigious Public Universities

College Search & Selection
521

<p>W&M and Cal have completely different mission statements, peers, reputations, goals, etc…To compare them is an exercise in futility. W&M is the best at what they do; undergrad teaching in a LAC, public environment. It can be argued that UCB is the best large research U. Who has more prestige? Eye of the beholder. I am biased towards smaller>larger (for undergrad) ergo W&M has more prestige. I do not buy into the whole “famous professor with huge research grant trickles down to help the 18-22 yo students” theory. I think of Dr Sheldon Cooper’s condescension as a classic, somewhat accurate example.</p>

<p>I believe the best classroom is a teacher and student on opposite ends of a log and W&M does that better than any public school in America. To each their own.</p>

522

<p>RML,
Just to clarify, I’m not concerned whether W&M or any other school is more prestigious than Berkeley or anywhere else. I think prestige is a mostly stupid question and the search for it frequently leads people in the wrong direction. My original and subsequent comments are meant to expand the discussion to factors that might be more relevant to the aspiring college student in helping him/her make the right college selection. </p>

<p>My claim is that W&M provides a very strong undergraduate environment, possibly the best available among all public universities in the USA. I’m not interested in what is being done by mostly graduate students in some distant lab that has no connection to the average undergrad’s daily activities. My interest is—what will the student actually experience? There is a BIG difference in what the student at W&M will experience vs the student at UC Berkeley or one of the other behemoth state Us. </p>

<p>As for the PA score issue, I’m not claiming that they have it wrong-although that might be the case given the now-exposed corruption of the voting that goes on. No, I have a much stronger view—for people not pursuing a career in academia, there could not be a more useless statistic in the college search/ranking process than PA scores.</p>

523

<p>

In my view, it is more important how others view the academic reputation of my school versus things like endowment per student and alumni giving rates.</p>

524

<p>

</p>

<p>“What high school kids in Wisconsin think” is not the definition of prestige, MSauce. In fact, what high school kids anywhere think is not the definition of prestige. You keep confusing familiarity and awareness with prestige. They are not the same thing. “I’ve heard of X and I haven’t heard of Y” doesn’t mean that X is more prestigious than Y. It might mean the speaker isn’t particularly well-educated in the finer points or the more boutique schools.</p>

525

<p>Part of prestige is precisely that the great unwashed masses aren’t necessarily aware of something – that it’s known only or solely by those in the know. The little swank European hotel that only the cognoscenti know is as prestigious, if not more, than the Ritz in Paris that everyone knows about.</p>

<p>Deep Springs is highly prestigious even though only a handful of people know about it. The fact that only a handful of people know about it makes it even more prestigious because it implies that knowledge about it is only known by those-in-the-know.</p>

526

<p>ucb,
PA scores reflect a faculty’s research/publication accomplishments (maybe) and how it is seen by others in the closeted academic world. It is not a statement on the education that a student will receive at ABC College nor how he/she is prepared for post-graduate life. Plenty of schools deliver a superior education and experience to their undergrads, yet the corrupt PA scoring, academia’s scorecard, disfigures this important reality. </p>

<p>If you’re an employer, you’re sometimes using a school’s name (prestige?) as a way to screen who gets into the interview room and who doesn’t. If that’s all you got, then you’re in trouble. Individual substance is what matters. Get a very smart kid from low prestige school (there are some!) and a dud from high prestige school (there are lots!!) and which one would you hire??</p>

527

<p>Given limited time and resources most companies don’t recruit much at low level schools looking for a diamond in the coal. They go where most students are good enough to meet their needs and then look for fit and other factors.</p>

528

<p>barrons,
I agree and that is another reason why student selectivity is so important. Employers want able students—they don’t care about PA scores. Sometimes you will find both, but what draws the employers are the students. Take a high PA faculty and pair them with a low selectivity student body and very few (if any!) top employers will make the trip.</p>

529

<p>Actually in my experience there is both. In the more practial fields profs can have great influence over rescruitment as they talk to business people all the time. Many do seminars at industry functions, outlook conferences, etc plus stay in touch with their own alumni now at major companies. In areas like engineering, business, computers, and sciences most profs are not just in the ivory tower. They know people all over the country/world.</p>

530

<p>The good news about college professors working in the more practical fields is that they’re not nearly as ideological as their colleagues in other departments. </p>

<p>% Liberal , % Moderate , % Conservative , Subject Area</p>

<p>10.7% , 78.0% , 11.3% , Computer Science & Engineering
20.5% , 59.0% , 20.5% , Health Sciences
21.3% , 54.3% , 24.5% , Business</p>

<p>45.2% , 47.0% , 7.8% , Physical & Biological Sciences
52.2% , 44.3% , 3.6% , Humanities
58.2% , 36.9% , 4.9% , Social Sciences</p>

<p>53.4% , 35.9% , 10.7% , Other</p>

<p>Perhaps this is due to the fact that they don’t spend as much time in the Ivory Tower and interact more frequently with practitioners in the real world who can put their theories to the test. </p>

<p>Whatever the reason, this pragmatism is appreciated in the business community, likely resulting in greater overlap of professional and academic respect for colleges that engage in connective experiences. Unfortunately, the faculty serving students in engineering, business, computers and science usually constitutes a minority of the faculty at most major universities.</p>

531

<p>^what a funny list of numbers!<br>
Who conducted this poll and where?
How many polled?<br>
What are the definitions for each category?
Does conservative = pragmatic?</p>

532

<p>The numbers come from a study done by professors from Harvard and George Mason. It was done in 2007. Here is the link:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~ngross/lounsbery_9-25.pdf[/url]”>http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~ngross/lounsbery_9-25.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

533

<p>The bottom line is that the UC schools are being decimated by cutbacks and layoffs. Word emanating from California is to avoid public universities there. Last year’s USNWR rankings were propped up by inflated PA numbers and selectivity fudging. So how all of this plays into the whole idea of “prestige” is beyond me.</p>

534

<p>As far as I could tell–and it’s not easy. the UC Sytem only got a small cut this year and I think the screams you hear are WAY over the top. Many schools have had similar cuts with only small ill effects. UC has a huge admin and could cut 10% without even feeling it.</p>

535

<p>hawkette,</p>

<p>which grads of between Berkeley and W&M are more employable in WS, NY.</p>

536

<p>

</p>

<p>Agree – and “good enough” doesn’t have to mean “prestigious.” Just “good enough.”</p>

537

<p>“As far as I could tell–and it’s not easy. the UC Sytem only got a small cut this year and I think the screams you hear are WAY over the top. Many schools have had similar cuts with only small ill effects. UC has a huge admin and could cut 10% without even feeling it.”</p>

<p>What they said (at Cal Day) was that they’ve already started hiring again (at least some departments), so the cuts aren’t really worrying me.</p>

538

<p>Cal cannot be allowed to fail. It is the flagship public university of the largest state in the nation and one of the World’s top 10 universities. And the myth that students will be forced to stay 6 years to graduate is pathetic. I have no idea who started that lie. I have known literally dozens of Cal students. Virtually all Arts and Science majors graduated in 4 years and all Engineers in 5 years. I never knew anybody at Cal who needed more than 5 years to graduate.</p>

539

<p>They don’t let engineers take longer to graduate, they have limits on how many semesters that you can attend, and after that you need to appeal. So, they want you to graduate in 4 years.</p>

<p>The only person that I knew who took longer than 6 years to graduate, took 18 years, because of a huge break. The only way that I could see taking longer than 4 is if you don’t plan your classes well, or you change majors fairly late.</p>

540

<p>They don’t let you stay longer in business. Haas students told me they have to sign an agreement that they will have to graduate in two years.</p>