Undergraduate Education: Ranking What Counts

College Search & Selection
41

<p>

Phead, my experience at one major research university, the University of Chicago, was not as you’ve described. First, classes at Chicago generally are not taught from textbooks at all. They are taught from primary sources. Second, there are very few large classes at Chicago. Third, many “star” professors there do teach undergraduates, often in small discussion classes. Fourth, the college provides ample teacher training (has a center for this purpose) and provides sought-after awards to distinguished teachers. Fifth, my experience (perhaps things have changed) is that Chicago professors tend to employ a Socratic style that challenges students to show they have not only read the material, but thought about it.</p>

<p>From very early in its history, the Chicago philosophy has been that teaching and research excellence go hand-in-hand. It’s not enough to have great classroom presence; scholarship matters too. But even the best scholars benefit by continually exposing their ideas to discussion in ordinary language by non-specialists.</p>

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<p>Tk:</p>

<p>The Johns Hopkins model of the elite scientific research institute offering specialized graduate training and traditional American undergraduate liberal arts college was first adopted and used by the University of Chicago “very early on in its history.” The University of Chicago was based off the Johns Hopkins university research model. :slight_smile: Since its inception, UChicago has place an heavy emphasis on specialized graduate level training and laboratory instruction, plus liberal arts education yadi yadi yada…</p>

<p>Johns Hopkins provides everything you said above (large amounts of small class room discussion, LOTS of primary resource material for non science related class such as in business and the humanities, research and teaching excellence), it is nothing new to me. :-P</p>

<p>I’m pretty sure UChicago uses Stewart or Otto Brestscher in Calculus 1+2/Linear algebra since the Harvard professor who taught Calculus was a UChicago PhD graduate… Regurgitations from the textbooks really depends on which major you are. It is mainly in large lecture halls with introductory chemistry, general biology, organic chemistry, calculus, and science related courses that primarily teach from the textbook. For humanities classes, it may be different…</p>

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<p>midatlmom,
Given your comments above, maybe you should change your name from “midatlmom” to “hawkette’smom.” :stuck_out_tongue: Sorry if you don’t like the discussion or my arguments, but I will add that your objections might be better received if they were made without the vinegar. Oh well, you and I have had this dispute before, so I shouldn’t be surprised. </p>

<p>RML,
I checked on how much movement there has been in both the USNWR overall rankings and in the PA-only rankings during the period from 1995 to 2008. Not much. A few have moved up or down more than a little, but most have stayed in a pretty tight range. Should this pattern hold true for the Teaching results of 1995? I don’t know and, based on what I have learned from other sources of input about faculty teaching performance, I have my doubts about a few of the schools. </p>

<p>Change in PA Rank , 2008 Rank , 1995 Rank , School</p>

<p>8 , 6 , 14 , U Chicago
7 , 29 , 36 , Notre Dame
7 , 19 , 26 , Wash U
6 , 8 , 14 , U Penn
4 , 23 , 27 , Vanderbilt
4 , 23 , 27 , Georgetown</p>

<p>3 , 29 , 32 , Emory
3 , 14 , 17 , Dartmouth
3 , 14 , 17 , U Virginia
2 , 6 , 8 , Caltech
2 , 5 , 7 , UC Berkeley
1 , 19 , 20 , Carnegie Mellon
0 , 14 , 14 , Brown
0 , 14 , 14 , Northwestern
0 , 8 , 8 , Columbia
0 , 8 , 8 , Cornell
0 , 4 , 4 , Princeton
0 , 4 , 4 , Yale
0 , 1 , 1 , Harvard
0 , 1 , 1 , Stanford
0 , 1 , 1 , MIT
-3 , 23 , 20 , Rice</p>

<p>-4 , 12 , 8 , Duke
-4 , 12 , 8 , U Michigan
-4 , 8 , 4 , Johns Hopkins
-5 , 18 , 13 , UCLA</p>

<p>*These are the only schools for which I had PA ranks in both 1995 and 2008. </p>

<p>Here are how the overall ranks changed from 1995 to 2008:</p>

<p>Change in USNWR Ranking , 2008 Rank , 1995 Rank , School</p>

<p>10 , 12 , 22 , Wash U
7 , 15 , 22 , Johns Hopkins
6 , 6 , 12 , U Penn</p>

<p>2 , 8 , 10 , U Chicago
2 , 12 , 14 , Northwestern
2 , 21 , 23 , UC Berkeley
2 , 22 , 24 , Carnegie Mellon
2 , 23 , 25 , Georgetown
1 , 6 , 7 , Caltech
1 , 8 , 9 , Columbia
1 , 14 , 15 , Cornell
1 , 18 , 19 , Notre Dame
0 , 1 , 1 , Harvard
0 , 2 , 2 , Princeton
0 , 4 , 4 , MIT
0 , 4 , 4 , Stanford
0 , 18 , 18 , Vanderbilt
-1 , 3 , 2 , Yale
-2 , 8 , 6 , Duke
-2 , 18 , 16 , Emory
-3 , 11 , 8 , Dartmouth
-3 , 25 , 22 , UCLA</p>

<p>-5 , 16 , 11 , Brown
-5 , 17 , 12 , Rice
-5 , 26 , 21 , U Michigan
-6 , 23 , 17 , U Virginia</p>

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<p>My subjective top seven are the top seven in hawkette’s scheme.
Certainly an improvement on USN&WR. It would be nice to have more recent and regular teaching surveys. Getting rid of the PA improves the value of any ranking.</p>

45

<p>I have to post in this thread just so I can be included as a “partisan” or a “clueless academic,” whichever group hawkette is holding in lowest esteem this week. :)</p>

46

<p>Hawkette is there any where you can release USNEWs 2009 ranking for top 100 universities? I have high interest in knowing so.</p>

<p>-Thanks</p>

47

<p>2009 USNWR Best Colleges Rank , National University</p>

<p>1 , Harvard
2 , Princeton
3 , Yale
4 , MIT
4 , Stanford
6 , Caltech
6 , U Penn
8 , Columbia
8 , Duke
8 , U Chicago
11 , Dartmouth
12 , Northwestern
12 , Wash U
14 , Cornell
15 , Johns Hopkins
16 , Brown
17 , Rice
18 , Emory
18 , Vanderbilt
18 , Notre Dame
21 , UC Berkeley
22 , Carnegie Mellon
23 , U Virginia
23 , Georgetown
25 , UCLA
26 , U Michigan
27 , USC
28 , Tufts
28 , Wake Forest
30 , U North Carolina
31 , Brandeis
32 , W&M
33 , NYU
34 , Boston Coll
35 , Georgia Tech
35 , Lehigh
35 , UCSD
35 , U Rochester
35 , U Wisconsin
40 , U Illinois
41 , Case Western
41 , Rensselaer
41 , U Washington
44 , UC Davis
44 , UC Irvine
44 , UC Santa Barbara
47 , Penn State
47 , U Texas
49 , U Florida
50 , Yeshiva
51 , Tulane
51 , U Miami
53 , George Washington
53 , Syracuse
53 , U Maryland
56 , Ohio State
56 , Pepperdine
58 , U Georgia
58 , U Pittsburgh
60 , Boston University
61 , Clemson
61 , Fordham
61 , U Minnesota
64 , Rutgers
64 , Texas A&M
66 , Miami U (OH)
66 , Purdue
66 , SMU
66 , U Conn
66 , U Iowa
71 , Indiana U
71 , Michigan State
71 , U Delaware
71 , Virginia Tech
71 , Worcester
76 , Baylor
77 , Marquette
77 , SUNY Binghampton
77 , U Colorado
80 , Clark
80 , Colorado Sch Mines
80 , St. Louis Univ
83 , American U
83 , NC State
83 , SUNY-Envi Sci/For
83 , Stevens Institute
83 , U Alabama
83 , U Tulsa
89 , Drexel
89 , Iowa State
89 , UC Riverside
89 , U Denver
89 , U Kansas
89 , U Nebraska
89 , U Vermont
96 , Auburn
96 , Northeastern
96 , SUNY-Stony Brook
96 , U Arizona
96 , UC Santa Cruz
96 , U Missouri (Columbia)
102 , Florida State
102 , Howard
102 , Illinois Inst Tech
102 , U Mass
102 , U of San Diego
102 , U of the Pacific
108 , U of Dayton
108 , U Oklahoma
108 , U Oregon
108 , U South Carolina
108 , U Tennessee
113 , BYU
113 , Texas Christian
113 , U New Hampshire
116 , Catholic U
116 , Loyola U (Chi)
116 , Ohio University
116 , U Kentucky
116 , Washington State
121 , Arizona State
121 , Clarkson
121 , Michigan Tech
121 , U Buffalo-SUNY
125 , Colorado State</p>

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<p>well hoedown, at least you haven’t been accused of being hawkette’s mother :eek: The thought of it is giving my vinegary self a serious case of acid reflux</p>

49

<p>-Thanks</p>

<p>I must be thinking of 2010 ranking. I was talking about the ranking release this August. I thought your purchase a book which release the ranking early… like other people have purchase before.</p>

50

<p>^ The 2010 rankings will be available in the August 17th issue of USNWR.</p>

51

<p>Who here actually purchased the USNews ranking magazine or a subscription to the premium edition on the internet who isn’t a high school senior?</p>

<p>I’m just curious because as a dirt poor college student, I cannot afford the luxury of USNews 2009 Best college magazine…I loathe those with the 2009 premium edition. :stuck_out_tongue: psyche.</p>

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<p>

That’s good. So there are at least two major research universities where undergraduate education is not entirely “regurgitation from the textbooks”. At least not in the humanities or social sciences. (Phead, I’m confident there are many more than two.)</p>

<p>Do mathematics and science courses need to rely heavily on textbooks, up to a certain level? Maybe. I do not recall using them in science core courses at Chicago. But it’s been a while. I do recall using Hermann Weyl’s Symmetry<a href=“not%20a%20textbook”>/u</a> in the first quarter of the physical science sequence. The senior mathematics instructor in my kid’s high school IB program does not use textbooks; he uses his own material entirely, with heavy emphasis on proofs and original problem solving.

Yes, JHU played a very significant role as an education innovator during the last quarter of the 19th century. Other schools evolved into universities from small colleges established to train ministers and lawyers. Hopkins was created as a university, emphasizing advanced research at the graduate level. </p>

<p>Chicago was one of several schools influenced by this model, but did more than simply copy it. It was founded as a much larger operation than the original JHU, with its own innovations in university administration, a library system, publications, and facilities built around Oxbridge-style quadrangles. Hopkins apparently started off more like an innovative think-tank than a modern university campus, because the founders were intent on investing in brains not buildings. Chicago had the luxury of being able to buy both, thanks to John D. Rockefeller’s oil money. Since the 1890s it has continually reinvented and refined its own educational model (as Hopkins no doubt has, too).</p>

<p>JHU’s early influence is covered in Chapter 9 of Higher Education in Transition<a href=“by%20Brubacher%20and%20Rudy,%20available%20on%20Google%20Books”>/u</a>. </p>

<p>[Higher</a> education in transition: a … - Google Book Search](<a href=“Higher Education in Transition: A History of American Colleges and Universities - John Seiler Brubacher, Willis Rudy - Google Books”>Higher Education in Transition: A History of American Colleges and Universities - John Seiler Brubacher, Willis Rudy - Google Books)</p>

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<p>^ TK:</p>

<p>I absolutely agree with you. I now realize that I shouldn’t have superimposed my limited background and experience in mainly mathematics and science courses and labeled “all major research universities” as champions of the “regurgitation style” teaching method.</p>

<p>Chicago and Hopkins both began as graduate oriented universities… Chicago definitely got the best end of the deal. The sheer amount of Nobel prize laureates is a testament to Chicago’s adoption and refinement of the research model to fit its own special needs. Rockefeller’s oil money sure did help a lot in attract the best and brightest to UChicago. It made Chicago what it is today, one of the greatest universities and centers of academia in the country. Definitely :)</p>

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<p>Before we get too happy with U Chicago, let’s remember that Everyday Math is a product of that institution :P</p>

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<p>Seriously? :jaw drops: No way, you cannot be serious!</p>

<p>[Everyday</a> Mathematics](<a href=“http://everydaymath.uchicago.edu/]Everyday”>http://everydaymath.uchicago.edu/)</p>

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<p>haha my little brother’s math textbook was “Everyday Mathematics”, he thought the textbook was terrible</p>

57

<p>What’s bad about it? The content, or the way it has been applied?</p>

<p>This must be a product of the graduate department of education, or possibly of the laboratory schools. I doubt it has anything to do with the graduate math department or the college. </p>

<p>The U of C education department was founded by John Dewey and had a rather illustrious history. However, it was shut down more than a decade ago when the university decided it was no longer up to standards.</p>

<p>… Oh, now I see, it’s the product of a research center in the Physical Sciences Division.</p>

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<p>^ I only had to suffer through Everyday Math for two years. It teaches poorly and attempts to hide the real concepts behind silly little facades. I think the idea was to produce a package that could be used without any real teaching, allowing it to “work” with teachers who are very poor at math.</p>

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<p>the ways that they taught math was stupid…I can understand why many students struggle with math since their methods are stupid</p>

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<p>

</p>

<p>Yes, but you do know that faculty/professors/deans’ opinions/knowledge/understanding are more stable than those of the students’. </p>

<p>How the deans, profs, school presidents create their opinion is by studying the subject very carefully. They just don’t make a conclusion out of the blues. They usually investigate or research. And when everything is curved in their minds, they can’t be easily erased, unless something drastic changes happened. </p>

<p>As with the “Undergraduate Teaching”, it’s the students that assess the professors. Of course, you’d get varied and sporadic responses. When one faculty is rated poorly, the school usually replaces that faculty creating a drastic change in the survey result. All schools --small or big, well endowed or not – can easily patch whatever negative rating they get on this area. But to get the interest and respect of the professor, deans, scholars, school presidents is a daunting task that only few schools have achieved.</p>