USC Rankings/Reaction

Colleges & Universities A-Z University of Southern California
1

<p>USC has been steadily rising in rankings since Steven Sample became president in 1991. </p>

<p>Recently, there was a thread started here in the USC forum-
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-southern-california/727030-ranking-rigging-usc.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-southern-california/727030-ranking-rigging-usc.html&lt;/a> This thread was also placed on the Featured Discussions list in the General Forum and now will be highlighted indefinitely.</p>

<p>There have been complaints about the placing of this thread. This one was posted in the Community & Forum Issues forum-
<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/community-forum-issues/728863-what-does-cc-have-against-usc.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/community-forum-issues/728863-what-does-cc-have-against-usc.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>My question for discussion is NOT about College Confidential bias or thread placement. It is about USC's rising rankings and the reaction to it. Is USC deserving of its criticism or is there some jealousy? Has USC fairly gained this popularity or are they "cheating?"</p>

<p>What do you think?</p>

2

<p>Thanks for starting that post. I commented on it, and I hope that the rest of us here will join in supporting USC by asking the moderators to remove the rank rigging post from the CC-talk homepage.</p>

3

<p>I sent a private note to the Admin/Moderator who posted the original thread, and he has yet to even respond.</p>

4

<p>Hi,
I also posted a complaint about the original “featured post” and my thread was just summarily deleted. I asked for an explanation but wasn’t given any. I have also asked why USC is not listed among the top CC colleges – based on numbers of posts it should be listed there instead of buried in the “S” under general colleges. But no response to that either. Seems like someone at CC admin has a serious vendetta against USC. Too bad they can’t be unbiased.</p>

5

<p>Its a conspiracy against USC</p>

6

<p>i agree completely.</p>

7

<p>The moderator probably went to a UC haha</p>

8

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<p>someone is biased against USC, and quite full of themself</p>

9

<p>well, he seems smart enough to know that a defamation suit can drown him and his little website in legal fees. Nonetheless, I doubt that we can expect an ethical response to our pleads – I didn’t know cc was a for-profit website. More hits, more $.</p>

10

<p>rosieoney - i agree! i was just thinking about that as I have to go to ‘alphabetic list of colleges’ etc… to get here… and like, USC is one of the US dream schools, and our transfer thread was like RIDICULOUSLY long :stuck_out_tongue: i think theres a lot of interest in USC on here, so i agree, it should be under CC TOP Universities :)</p>

11

<p>So menloparkmom’s thread was responded to by Mr. Dooley and then closed. I guess he thinks that college students can’t see through politically correct rhetoric. </p>

<p>Further, it’s so hypocritical to run a site based on discussion, and then turn around and close a thread, thereby ceasing any possible discussion in an especially sensitive and important subject.</p>

12

<p>I feel CC is discriminating against USC. Every US NEWS University ranked #1-26, except for the ivies-they have their own category-is listed and linked as a “Top University”. Yet they added UNC, a great university, but it does not fit the pattern. The natural order would be #27 USC not #30 UNC.</p>

<p>@squadus
-Yes a moderator did go to a UC. Guess which UC moderator “UCLAri” went to.</p>

13

<p>Haha I couldn’t guess. :D</p>

<p>Even through all of this talk over the National Academy membership, I’m willing to bet the peer review score must be low (if I had membership to the website I could check lol). The UC’s and other rivaling sports schools can’t possibly be giving USC high scores haha. So it seems to even out anyways. I love how the admin closed the thread, said USC was a recommendable school and didn’t provide any reason as to why it isn’t in the CC Top Schools list. :P</p>

14

<p>Not very many substantive posts so far. Even the “why is USC not listed as a top CC university” complaint was raised again. Grrr…</p>

<p>As a “doubter on the record” I will rehash some of my previously stated observations:</p>

<p>1) Size of graduating class is nearly 3x that of the freshman class. I am not debating the quality of the transfer students, I have no data to argue either way. However, I have yet to hear a single explanation for that unusual situation, not seen among similarly ranked private colleges. I am explicitly excluding public colleges because some of them have a mandate of accepting transfers from CC. Yes, USC is highly tuition-dependent and needs a large class to amortize its costs. So why not admit a large class upfront and have transfer admission rates more characteristic of a Tier 1 private national university? The dual admission structure is reminiscent in some sense of dual stock ownership structures of some companies.</p>

<p>2) Great focus on test scores, once again more explicitly evident than other private collecges in the 20-30 rank range. Evidence for this is the automatic tuition discount given to NMF finallists who designate USC as their top choice. Why do they need to designate USC as their top choice, even after the fact (they could have designated somebody else, not getted accepted there, then change their election and get the tuition benefit). Other evidence for focus on test scores is that high SAT/ACT scorrers tend to get the smaller merit scholarships.</p>

<p>3) Merit scholarships, including full tuition, another highly unusual feature of a top-30 univeristy. These are usually reserved for the mid-50 crowd who will often throw money at students on the top end of their distribution in the hope of attracting them and gradually improving the quality of the student body. I am not implying there is anything shady about the practice. On the contrary, every organization looking to raise their profile is doing it. However, it is unusual for a school of the stature that USC aspires for.</p>

<p>4) USC no longer stands for University of Spoiled Children. Instead it stands for University of Stolen Colleagues. There was an article in the open media that I can no longer locate about a coordinated “attack” in multiple faculty members from a certain UCLA department. Once again, poaching a high profile faculty member from a rival institution is a time-honored tradition. However, the scale at which USC does it is suprising and begs the question — is this another facet of the NAS incident?</p>

<p>This is what comes to mind immediately, I am sure that over the years I have asked other related questions.</p>

<p>P.S. I should add that it is likely that EVERY school is attempting to rig the rankings, even when it does not matter. Don’t think that the administrators at Harvard were high-fiving each other this year when they managed to eek out ahead of Princeton? Don’t think every year they are not talking about that they can do to make it happen again? Think again. One of the few exceptions out there is Reid that simply refuses to submit the information USNWR is asking for, and as a result are ranked abnormally low.</p>

15

<p>Very good point about USC being in the top 27 and yet not represented in the “Top Universities” even though all others up to that point are in the list. I was just going by the amount of posts and it certainly warrants being at the top for that alone. But your discovering that correlation with the US News # is interesting. I definitely don’t understand the bias against USC. Thanks for pointing this out.</p>

16

<p>1) Can you please cite your source for your assertion that USC is highly tuition-dependent? I remember reading somewhere on here that USC is actually endowment-dependent, and relies heavily on alumni donations. This would not be surprising given all of the buildings, schools, auditoriums, departments, and chairs that are named and endowed. I don’t know if you are truly familiar with USC, but they have a deeply enmeshed tradition in contributing to their surrounding community. Although the student body is very diverse, you will notice that USC is, despite this, only locally known, albeit on an enormous scale. USC is not as internationally known as top-10 schools like Harvard and Stanford. Note though, that USC’s local outreach programs have won it many accolades, and that USC is the largest private employer in the city of Los Angeles. USC is heavily anchored in Los Angeles, and it is situated in an area with many issues which USC readily tackles. I am not saying that USC is held back by its location per se, but really, compare south LA to the cities of Palo Alto, Berkeley, Cambridge, Princeton, New Haven, Hanover… you will quickly note that these cities, home to some of the top universities in the country, are on the opposite side of the socioeconomic spectrum. While I’m sure that these top schools have prevalent presence in their home-cities, I can assure you that this presence is more like a college-town qualification, and not a “we are here to help” presence. I think that USC’s community-service character can explain its eagerness to take local transfer students, and that an economic rationale should not be quickly resorted to in addressing that question.</p>

<p>2/3) While USC is out-of-norm in the way that it openly rewards high-scorers in the SAT, you should note that USC is not yet at the Stanford et. al. level. We can not reach that level by simply emulating Stanford et. al., but rather we must attract a higher quality student body with these added incentives. As an entering transfer myself, I am very excited about studying with such a high-achieving student body, and I feel that transfer students like myself that were given a second chance can add to the student body’s worth by contributing a well-roundedness factor, thereby enforcing the diversity that USC values so much.</p>

<p>4) Instances like these should be assessed with the objective economic rationale with which you are approaching the make of USC’s student body. The distinction between poaching and attracting can be argued indefinitely. If UCLA’s faculty was effectively attracted by the incentives that USC offered, then UCLA has a problem with retention. If their retention abilities are compromised by a lack of funding, then they are lacking the resources to indefinitely remain an elite institution. Economics.</p>

17

<p>I just noticed today, that not only did he post the “Ranking Rigging at USC” thread on the CC Hot Topics main page (in order to get maximum postings), but it is also posted permanently in the USC Folder, ABOVE the USC current threads, and BELOW the USC 2012 and 2013 folders. It is just above “FAQ for USC Admissions”. Seems just as important as FAQ about Admissions, you agree ?</p>

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<p>All these SC haters</p>

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<p>** This is the list of what “CC” considers the “Top Universities”**</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/cc-top-universities/[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/cc-top-universities/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Funny, how if you go to each of the school folders, there are no negative threads listed as “Hot Topics” (that were created by a CC Moderator). It is only with USC’s folder that a Moderator posted a “Hot Topic” that is highly critical of USC.</p>

<p>CC Top Universities </p>

<p>California Institute of Technology ( 21,583 Posts | 1,777 Topics )
Carnegie Mellon University ( 26,236 Posts | 2,890 Topics )
Duke University ( 49,622 Posts | 5,005 Topics )
Emory University ( 24,411 Posts | 2,765 Topics )
Georgetown University ( 35,305 Posts | 3,980 Topics )
Johns Hopkins University ( 29,083 Posts | 3,523 Topics )
Massachusetts Institute of Technology ( 70,195 Posts | 5,385 Topics )
Northwestern University ( 42,363 Posts | 4,505 Topics )
Rice University ( 32,168 Posts | 2,869 Topics )
Stanford University ( 81,156 Posts | 7,204 Topics )
University of California - Berkeley ( 116,874 Posts | 12,243 Topics )
University of California - Los Angeles ( 116,558 Posts | 9,912 Topics )
University of Chicago ( 65,485 Posts | 4,748 Topics )
University of Michigan - Ann Arbor ( 76,494 Posts | 8,567 Topics )
University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill ( 26,770 Posts | 2,864 Topics )
University of Notre Dame ( 25,920 Posts | 2,460 Topics )
University of Virginia ( 43,374 Posts | 4,237 Topics )
Vanderbilt University ( 18,888 Posts | 2,160 Topics )
Washington University - St. Louis ( 30,450 Posts | 3,221 Topics )</p>

<p>And, here is USC’s folder. </p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-southern-california/[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/university-southern-california/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>**University of Southern California ( 80,328 Posts | 6,955 Topics ) **</p>

<p>Maybe it is because USC is not a “Top University” that it has more posts and topics than the vast majority of the “Top Universities”. USC has 80,328 posts, and 6,955 topics. There are three schools in the Top list that have more posts and/or topics. (I am not implying that the number of posts is an indication of how good the school is. Not at all. However, I do find it ironic, for not being a “Top” school (per CC) how popular USC is, in terms of threads, and posts.</p>

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<p>

</p>

<p>I don’t have a source, but I have heard before from administrators that USC is still very tuition dependent - a large amount of endowment goes to financial aid and merit scholarships, and alumni donations almost always end up in endowment (except for building donations)</p>

<p>Also, alumni donations tend to be concentrated on the professional schools (Viterbi, SCA, etc) which leaves the college especially tuition dependent.</p>