US NEWS Ranking, A few surprises

This thread seems to be off topic. It’s not focusing on UC.

Back to the UC’s then, you also have to wonder if parents who are footing the bill are seeing the political activism at UCB as a big negative, vs the less activist campus at UCLA. This of course drives more student apps and more qualified students to UCLA over UCB.

“This thread seems to be off topic. It’s not focusing on UC”

@Silivon …true…was going to say something about the UCLA/Fresno State game tonight…better not! The last UC thread on here had over 82 pages on it (from what I recall) lol!

That is indeed true. Upon further investigation, Yale and Williams, in additional to UCLA, seem to be very aggressive at reporting this number …
http://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/search1ba.aspx?institutionid=164465,168342,110662,130794,166027,170976,186131,199120,217156,236948

I have heard that Yale finally decided to hire a few new CS faculty members three years ago because its 20 faculty members can’t handle the huge amount of students in undergraduate classes. But one of the newly hired, Mahesh Balakrishnan, showed up for less than 2 years and then went to Facebook to do some kind of research. It is hard to imagine this particular individual is dedicated to undergraduate education. Yale probably counts this individual’s salary as part of the Instructional_Expenditures/FTE.

Read https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2018/04/20/comp-sci-profs-call-for-more-hires/
and http://www.cs.yale.edu/homes/mahesh/

This Instructional_Expenditures/FTE number accounts for a whopping 11% in WSJ/THE’s methodology.

Watch this “Jerry, just remember. It’s not a lie… if you believe it…”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vn_PSJsl0LQ

USNWR rankings are just like this.

From this "Playing With Numbers " article (https://washingtonmonthly.com/2000/09/01/playing-with-numbers/) …

Good luck trying to measure “actual learning”…albeit the proof of that usually goes back to what people think of the graduates of a particular college over time.

USNews is probably the best undergraduate ranking. It tries to gauge the actual quality of education at the undergrad level, as well as academic support, capacity to spend money on undergrads, and alumni satisfaction.

My main problem with their ranking is this:

Some schools, like Northeastern, Georgia and USC, are ranked ahead of their academic reputations/quality. Others, like Wisconsin, Illinois and Texas (and many other top state schools), are ranked below their general academic reps. Academic quality is the most important thing to me.

@prezbucky But some data are false. How can you expect the high quality outputs when the usnews inputs a lot of false data?

@prezbucky But how do you measure “academic quality”. Many star faculty are top researchers but rotten teachers, if they teach undergraduates at all.

@TomSrOfBoston Yes, that’s another point why the usnews is misleading. Many professors in top research universities do not teach classes. They do research.

@Dave_Berry I saw your previous “8 More Colleges Submitted Incorrect Data for Rankings” (http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/2096811-8-more-colleges-submitted-incorrect-data-for-rankings.html) .
Here are more points. Will you trust USnews?

I couldn’t agree more strongly to this. Look at the methodology and tell me a single metric that speaks to quality of the undergraduate experience. There are none. There’s nothing about class size, quality of teaching, access to labs, quality of facilities, ease of getting classes, nothing. What they offer is an attempt at a proxy to those things, poor ones at that.

@eyemgh But the false data are also misleading. For example, you thought one university offers more than half of classes that is less than 20 students, so you accepted the admission offer and paid 50,000 dollars to the university. But when you get into the university, you found most of the classes are more than 20 students. What are your feelings?

@eyemgh,

Class size is a metric. Teaching quality is hard to judge but they ask deans to weigh in. It’s their job to know their own quality and that of their competitors.

Access to labs/research may be a valid dislike, as Idon’t see anything in the formula for that.

Quality of facilities is another ambiguous judgment and is best judged, overall, by those who know (teachers, researchers and admins).

Honestly, my biggest problems are that they don’t put enough emphasis on the academic rep rating by teachers/deans, and too much on the guidance counselors. Guidance counselors are not on campus and don’t know anything about the quality of academics. They only know what their students want.

@Silivon Perhaps you need to adjust your expectations. I would never select a college based on a ranking. Why don’t you voice your concerns to US News https://www.usnews.com/info/features/contact

@chercheur I chose USC solely based on Usnews. But I was a little regretting. I had already sent usnews my voice with these two links: (http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/2100285-here-are-some-reasons-why-usnews-college-ranking-means-nothing-at-all.html#latest) and (http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/2096811-8-more-colleges-submitted-incorrect-data-for-rankings.html#latest).
Let’s wait for them for response.

If you are unhappy with your college, that is not the fault of US News. It was your responsibility to research colleges before applying and accepting. Are you a freshman? If so, give it time. College is a big adjustment.

A piece of advice: when you get upset about something, do not go blasting the person/company on the internet. Discuss your problem directly with the person/company, instead.

@chercheur No. I had already graduated. But I need to leave my voice to all college applicants: Do not solely rely on one ranking, do your work to try to find the best university for yourself, not for others.

@chercheur But we also hope Usnews provide more accurate data in the future.

That’s something we can agree on!