Fordham moved from 60 in 2017, to 61 in 2018 to 70 in 2019. I always thought Fordham was good about supporting low income students from the local area but perhaps they are not low income enough (Pell Grant eligible).
@boomer1964, Florida is solid but with over 35,000 students, class size must be huge like Ohio State with over 45,000 undergrad students. I agree, don’t see how GA Tech and UF would be peers. There may be some specific majors that are strong at UF.
The Honor’s program is particularly robust at UGA and fosters a close knit serious community of students. As many are posting, like @jzducol and @dragonmom3 , increasing numbers of families in CA are not happy with the large classes at UC schools, TA taught courses, difficulty in graduating in four years… Some of it may be typical of large public universities, but not all. S is at UGA Honors and class size is between 15 and 30 students so far.
@Fisherman99, would take Harbaugh or Kelly over Helton seven days a week. Will see how USC does in Texas this week. An unimpressive Longhorn team which struggled to beat Tulsa last week may be challenged by the Trojans, but the coaching or lack of against Stanford last week was very apparent. With all the talent at USC, would love to see Kelly behind the helm at USC. They really need to let Helton and his mediocre lethargic staff go. With Darnold and company, the performance against Ohio State in the Cotton Bowl was embarrassing, although there were some bad ref calls favoring the Bucks in that game.
@Boomer1964 “I still cant see how UF is ranked the same as GTECH which I do not see them as peers.”
If you sort public universities by test scores.
1 Georgia Tech
2 Michigan, UCB
…
12 UCLA
…
21 Florida
If you sort by acceptance rate
(AF, Navy, Army are technically first ~10%)
1 UCLA 16
2 UCB 17
3 Georgia Tech 23
4 UNC 24
5 Michigan, UVA 27
…
? Florida 38
I really don’t get how Florida and Gtech can be linked in the same sentence let alone ranking. Gtech is such a unique school. Maybe I am just naive. But I guess it’s good Florida is getting some recognition. There really are great schools at every level.
Love both schools, but TBH, until GT joined the CA in 2013, its acceptance rate was over 50% (55% in 2012), higher than UF’s 2012 acceptance rate of 44%. UF has a strong engineering program. They are both excellent schools, with excellent programs.
@jym626 "its acceptance rate was over 50% "
That’s true, but the level of student that applies is the same. STEM is self selecting. Smart kids apply. Same students just more of them. If you look at the history of GT test scores there was no sudden jump when going to CA. Before the CA GT still had the highest public university test scores.
What hurts Gatech in these rankings are mainly 2 things.
Student teacher ratio 21 (15 to 17 typical for avg colleges)
Graduation rate 80% (90+ for Top colleges)
Depending on methodology graduation rate can used more than once. As a metric in quality, and financial outcomes for kids that don’t graduate.
With a large stem program the graduation rate cannot really be fixed. Engineering is hard people drop out.
Students at GT are satisfied. When looking at the student survey results on the WSJ, Gatech was just below MIT, Stanford, and above Princeton, Brown and many Ivy League schools, and above all the other public schools I looked at including UCB, UCLA, Michigan. I didn’t look at them all. William and Mary might have had better results.
GT’s graduation rate is dinged because of the co-ops and internships
When she was a grad student at UC Berkeley a couple of years ago my daughter was a TA, and she taught only discussion and help sections in support of the lectures. The actual course lectures were ALWAYS taught by professors. In her experience the claim of TAs teaching courses at Berkeley is a myth.
The huge surge in foreign applicants over the past couple of decades is only increasing–add to the that dedicated slots for URMS, first gen and other special buckets has forced kids --that would have traditionally been an assumption at the elite northeastern schools for example–to look elsewhere. Schools that used to be apply, pay and go are now competitive simply due to sheer numbers of applicants. The change in quality is likely more a result of better applicants than any huge change in the schools themselves. Perfect example is Vanderbilt. It has become a hot alternative to Duke, Emory etc.
@Greymeer Thank you! This pretty much proved my point. Not bashing UF by any means. It is a great school for sure, but it is NOT GTECH… For sure these rankings should be taken with a grain of salt… Princeton vs Harvard vs Stanford vs U Chicago vs Duke etc… We all know these are incredible schools not matter whether they are number 1 , 5, 7 etc. Any of these schools are close to impossible to get in. Reputation and prestige will always follow. Then you have the public “elites” such as Berkeley, Michigan, UVA , GTECH etc…A tier ranking would be better. Some other publications rank schools in tiers and makes more sense.
Perhaps 10 years from now, we might think of UF and maybe even UGA as public elites if they keep moving up in rankings and after so many years, we will have such perceptions… It does not happen from year to year no matter what these rankings say. A good example would be yours truly, The Ohio State University. Back in the day, all you needed was a pulse to get into this school. Actually this would apply to many of these schools. It is clear that once admissions requirements went up, OSU became much more competitive It is not an Elite school and I would not necessarily compare it academically to say (dare to say) Michigan, UCLA, Berkeley, GTECH, etc… But it is also not that far behind.some of these other schools. Many of the programs are top ten in the country and difficult to get in. So when looking at any of these schools, all the little things do matter. From some of the instate kids, some of these schools are a bargain. But paying out of state tuition to jump to the next “tier” makes absolutely no sense.
@Center, Vanderbilt is hot, as is Nashville itself which is truly booming with building in the city, revitalization, and a cultural and sports scene that is healthy and growing.
I can start to see why some people are looking outside USNWR for another opinion if they are looking for college rankings (faux). University of California–Santa Barbara and University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill are tied at #30 in USNWR National Universities ranking. If you look at WSJ/THE, UNC is ranked at #33 and UC Santa Barbara is ranked at #99. Remember that WSJ/THE rankings include LACs.
I don’t have USNWR compass so if someone has access, please let me know why they are ranked at the same place.
I have WSJ/THE access. I can tell you why they are ranked so differently in WSJ/THE rankings — (read its methodology for explanation of each metric)
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill >>>>> University of California, Santa Barbara
Rank 33 >>>>> 99
Overall Score 80.2/100 >>>>> 68.1/100
Outcomes score 37.6/40 (#14) >>>>> 30.0/40 (#66)
Resources score 20.7/30 (#89) >>>>> 14.0/30 (#383)
Engagement score 16.5/20 (#222) >>>>> 16.5/20 (#222)
Environment score 5.3/10 (#439) >>>>> 7.6/10 (#82)
Enrollment 18,123 >>>>> 20,699
Student-Faculty Ratio 14:1 >>>>> 17:1
Academic Spending Per Student $34,760 >>>>> $14,240
Salary 10 years after entering college $51,000 >>>>> $52,000
Default Rate 1.5% >>>>> 2.4%
Survey Results: Results are on a scale of zero to 10, with 10 representing strongest agreement.
Right Choice (If you could start over, would you still choose this college?) 8.25/10 >>>>> 8.3/10
Inspiring (Does your college provide an environment where you feel you are surrounded by exceptional students who inspire and motivate you?) 7.92/10 >>>>> 7.54/10
Career Preparation(Is your college effective in helping you to secure valuable internships that prepare you for your chosen career?) 7.35/10 >>>>> 7.23/10
It appears that lots of students (and parents) define “fit” by prestige or selectivity. See the “chance me for HYPSM” threads, or the threads from California students who want to apply only to the most selective UCs.
I loved attending Berkeley, but I’ve been around UCLA a bunch the last few years and I’m sure I would love it there too, as well as UCSB which is different from both of those. I’d like Stanford too which is different than Berkeley. Just like people can like lots of different kinds of foods or enjoy living by the beach, mountains, or in a city. Can’t speak for currently, but when I went to Cal lectures were never taught by TAs as several people have pointed out.
^Interesting insight, @ucbalumnus. It also explains why internationals who have no concept of what “fit” would even mean, given their home country’s choices, use the Ivy League as a default.
@nrtlax33, Forbes ranks UCSB in their 2018 Top College list at #85 and UNC at #47. I think UNC is overall the better public university. That said, there are probably some majors that are stronger at UCSB. If I were sending my kid to one of the two, it would likely be UNC. Been to both campuses. Both are very pretty aesthetically, but I don’t think it’s close if looking at both schools from the perspective of OOS.
When I was at UCB they didn’t have TAs teaching the big sections but they did have adjuncts, some of whom were recently-graduated PhDs from their department. Not sure if they still do that. I think on the Common Data Set there’s a place where you can see what percentage of faculty is full time and what percentage has a PhD. I’m not sure if there’s a line for tenure track.
As far as applying to both UCB and UCLA like someone else said, it’s the same application for all of the UCs, just an additional fee for each campus. I know kids who apply to several without visiting until they get in or not, or parents who won’t pay OOS/private tuition and want the “UCLA” or “Berkeley” label rather than looking for a smaller private school that would give merit and come in at the same price. I don’t know, my oldest wrote off ULCA after driving through the campus (no official tour), my 2nd thinks it’s too hot in LA. I still have never taken a real tour at UCLA… maybe my 3rd will be interested.
@washugrad I didn’t do a good job of brainwashing because I couldn’t even get my youngest to apply to Berkeley. He just didn’t like the feel there when we visited. He has been surprised by the weather at UCLA - it’s much cooler than he thought it would be. Temperatures there are often pretty close to San Diego - other parts of LA seem much hotter. First time we visited there, I was about ready to turn around after we got off at Wilshire Blvd - glad I didn’t.
@Nomorelurker : I can see if a ranking is so out of line with what is known to the public, it starts to lose its credibility.
USNews puts the service academies on the LAC list, not the U list, FWIW. Strictly undergrad institutions.