<p>Theprestige,</p>
<p>This ranking is the best I've ever seen. Its exactly what I have personally witnessed. As for WashU getting the bum deal, I think this ranking exposes the fact that the institution hasn't fully caught up with its increased selectivity.</p>
<p>Sakky, there are currently over 20,000 graduate students enrolled at top 10 Engineering programs. Can you say the same of the top 10 Pharmacy, Nursing or Dental programs?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Harvard is actually only 1% engineering. Yale, Brown, and Dartmouth are 5% or less engineering
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Let's peer through the looking glass the other way around.</p>
<p>Let's take the above statistic from collegehelp's analysis. Here are 4 of the top 10/15 schools with virtually zero to marginal representation in the engineering field. Which begs a number of questions, namely:</p>
<p>1) Should those school be penalized because they aren't going to be sending a large number of its grads to engineering grad schools in large numbers?
2) Is there any question that the large majority of those student bodies are clearly some of the absolute best students / minds in the nation?
3) Is there any question that despite the relative dearth of engineering grads coming out of these schools that most of these grads will go on to establish successful careers?
4) Last, but not least, how does one measure "success"? Annual salary? Isn't that a bit one-dimensional? What about influencing, shaping public policy? For instance, are graduates of Public Policy degrees who go onto to serve the public (either in the public sector - be it in the form of a Political Advisor, Congressman, Congresswoman, Senator, Governor, etc. or private or even non profit organizations?) - are they any less important members of society than a guy building a bridge? </p>
<p>IMO there are many issues / problems facing America today and in her future - education, health, fiscal policy, disease, stem cell research, environment, etc. etc. Who do you think are on the front lines debating, influencing and shaping public policy in those and many other areas -- and while you ponder that question -- ask yourself what kind of dollar amount you would attach to those charged with that task.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Sakky, there are currently over 20,000 graduate students enrolled at top 10 Engineering programs. Can you say the same of the top 10 Pharmacy, Nursing or Dental programs?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Then by that token, we should kick out medical school too. After all, look at the populations. Johns Hopkins Medical has only 470 students, Duke has only 420, Stanford has 400, Washington U has only 450. Harvard has 700, UCSF has 600, Penn has 700, UWash has 770, Yale has 500, Baylor has 660. That's a total of less than 5000 students in the top 10 medical schools.</p>
<p>Should you take prestige into account? Engineering is more prestigious than being a member of congress...but not as prestigious as farming or firefighting...</p>
<p>I can understand why medicine is among the "big three" but not law and business....unless it is the money or dressing up in suits.</p>
<p>recent Harris Poll of occupation's prestige from the Wall Street Journal, July 26, 2006</p>
<p>"I am going to read off a number of different occupations. For each, would you tell me if you feel it is an occupation of very great prestige, considerable prestige, some prestige or hardly any prestige at all?"</p>
<p>Firefighter 63% 23% 11% 3% -<br>
Doctor 58 30 10 1 1<br>
Nurse 55 24 17 4 -<br>
Scientist 54 26 15 4 *<br>
Teacher 52 22 20 6 *<br>
Military officer 51 30 16 3 1<br>
Police officer 43 26 26 4 1<br>
Priest/Minister/Clergyman 40 28 24 7 1<br>
Farmer 36 21 26 15 1<br>
Engineer 34 35 26 4 1<br>
Member of Congress 28 23 31 17 1<br>
Architect 27 24 33 19 1<br>
Athlete 23 24 33 19 1<br>
Lawyer 21 23 36 20 *<br>
Entertainer 18 23 37 22 *<br>
Accountant 17 30 40 11 1<br>
Banker 17 29 43 11 1<br>
Journalist 16 27 41 16 *<br>
Union Leader 12 21 38 25 3<br>
Actor 12 13 37 37 1<br>
Business executive 11 30 43 15 1<br>
Stockbroker 11 25 42 22 1<br>
Real estate agent/broker 6 17 44 32 1</p>
<p>Haha.. farmer……</p>
<p>collegehelp,</p>
<p>the fact that firefighter is no. 1 on that list, followed by nurses and teachers rounding up a Top 5 suggests that this is a list of occupations that most people "admire" or "respect" rather than finding them particularly "prestigious".</p>
<p>i mean i admire and respect the heck out of a guy who is willing to risk his own life to run into a burning building to save a newborn - but is that a prestigious job?</p>
<p>also, if i remember anything from my statistics class - it was always to question / be skeptical of polls such as this.</p>
<p>key point: the major assumption being made with this poll is that the general public (or those being polled) have a true grasp of the word "prestige" (i.e. not confusing it with admiration)</p>
<p>for instance, IMO, one of the most prestigious jobs one can ever hold is to become a Justice of the US Supreme Court - this is something that is both earned and you need to be nominated by the President and then confirmed by the US Senate - once confirmed you wield trememdous amount of influence / power - and it is a lifelong position.</p>
<p>but i don't even see judges on that list above...</p>
<p>I hesitate to disagree with someone whose middle name is "prestige"...but</p>
<p>the survey question used the word "prestige"</p>
<p>What does prestige mean to the general public? Evidently it has something to do with service to society, dedication, sacrifice, integrity, character. Evidently money is not an important factor.</p>
<p>As I recall, the WSJ article used the term "graduate programs" in their feeder school study but then focused on three professional disciplines instead. It would be too much work to actually do this, but hypothetically it might be interesting to add PhD production data to your model (the Baccalaureate Origins study). When I read it, I found a lot of flaws in the WSJ feeder school study.</p>
<p>I think of engineering as pre-professional, but not political science. I think of engineering as similar to Law, Medicine, Business. Nursing, teaching, and so on are not as similar to Law, Medicine, Business. I think it has something to do with how hard it is to get into the professional program.</p>
<p>Maybe you could add the US News engineering rank (which is based on peer assessment) and business rank.</p>
<p>Sakky, you know what I mean. We can all point out reasons why some fact are untrue, but at the end of the day, we all know that Engineering is one of the main professions. In some parts of the World, like in Asia and Europe, Engineers hold a more esteemed position in society than Lawyers or Businessmen. </p>
<p>Pharmacy, Dentistry, Optometry, Nursing, Education, Journalism, Architecture, Music, Art etc... are all important professions too. I have no objection to those professions being included in the WSJ study. However, including those professional programs probably won't alter the overall WSJ ranking that much. Including Engineering in the survey would probably change the WSJ outcome a great deal, especially in the case of Caltech, CMU, MIT and Harvey Mudd, but also, although to a lesser extent, in the case of other universities with large and active undergraduate engineering programs.</p>
<p>(double post, sorry!)</p>
<p>The difference you guys are debating about comes down to 1) "vocational" degrees" - i.e. nursing, engineering, film, whatever - vs. 2) "prestige" degrees, where you can major in anything. </p>
<p>In category 1 you are learning a real skill in college. And we're not talking biology major here, we're talking about real skills like computer science or nursing. You are hired as an engineer because the "program" is good and specific skills matter. Places like Purdue excel here, and places like Michigan excel even more. But the program rank is paramount, not the school rank for most of these types of careers. </p>
<p>For most people, category 2 matters more. You can major in almost anything at Dartmouth or Brown and still get a job at Bain, get into the top grad school of you choice, and pretty much do anything. Most often, you'll probably end up managing people in "vocational" careers. For this reason most Ivy engineers go into business, realizing that in the end they end up managing people who went to more hardcore engineering schools. </p>
<p>Lets face it, i'd rather be off in the real world with a Brown poli sci degree than a UCLA one, regardless of the ranking of the ranking of UCLA's graduate poli sci dept. Similarly, a Yale or Dartmouth engineer is much more attractive to consulting firms than one from UIUC, even if UIUC engineering dept has a higher rank. BUT if I actually wanted to be an engineer (which most of the engineers at the Ivies never do), I would much rather go to UIUC than Yale.</p>
<p>The problem is that most entering college students don't realize the difference. They post things like "what college has a great history or econ dept," not realizing that type of ranking doesn't hold in most areas.</p>
<p>You sure do find a way to slip Dartmouth into every convo, don’t you…… :rolleyes:</p>
<p>Engineering is not a "vocational degree". You always say that it is, but it isn't. Engineers have to be highly proficient mathematicians and physicists, as well as highly analytical and organized. I know I could not be an Engineer, even if I wanted to. Engineers have won nobel prizes in Chemistry and physics. Schools like Caltech and MIT have become woprld class intellectual institutions because of their Engineering programs. Sorry, but that is not what a vocational field produces/</p>
<p>And Slipper, most people would think just as highly as Brown as they would of UCLA. As far as I am concerned, both are great universities. Fiske gives both universities a ***** academics rankings and according to the USNWR, the academic world gives them a 4.4 and 4.3 peer assessment score rating respectively.</p>
<p>
[quote]
As you may know, Dickinson ceased completing the inappropriately subjective "Academic Prestige" survey for "U.S.News".
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Isn't this what Dickinson College's president wrote about the Peer Assessment?</p>
<p>Alexandre, when I say "vocational" I mean a specific skill-set is learned. Perhaps its the wrong word. But just as say accounting, engineers are hired for hard skills, and the training during undergrad is actually critical to a job. Truthfully, I think engineering schools should be ranked seperately. But because many engineers dont go into engineering, that isn't even that simple. Georgia Tech might be one of the top 5 engineering schools in the world, but good luck getting a McKinsey job or having Harvard Law compensate you enough for that. </p>
<p>Once again, its much more than peer assessment. Most people give the Brown grad the edge because of BROWN, not the major. Brown wins when it comes to prestige and placement. It wins in all the non-academic intangibles that make the real difference. Do you really think Ohio State is better than Tufts? It isn't because OSU stinks at the non-academic intangibles that make all the difference, whereas Tufts excels comparatively in these areas.</p>
<p>
[quote]
This isn't the case in most business jobs which take almost any major as long as you go to a top school.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I could be wrong, but don't more traditional marketing and accounting firms prefer actual business majors when hiring recent grads? Not that I'm disagreeing with you overall. I worked for a financial services firm this summer and my boss got his BS in chemistry.</p>
<p>You know I think you just edited my quoted sentence out of your post... :p</p>
<p>This is scary. Using Prestige's updated data (post 115), and calculating simple and multiple regressions. All the factors (USNews ranking, WSJ, RP, and % NMS) are highly significantly correlated p<0.0005. The lowest correlation was for RP rank vs NMS rank (0.62). If one wanted to predict WSJ rank (conceding all the problems with the WSJ), then each of the other factors would produce a highly significant correlation. The highest correlation was with the USNews average rank. In fact, if one were to predict the WSJ rank using all three other factors, then, with USNews in the model, RP and NMS are no longer significant. So whatever the USNews does includes the predictive value of RP and NMS, if the goal is predicting who will end up in these professional schools.</p>
<p>Repeated deleting Caltech, since it is an outlier for WSJ based on its ranking on the other scales- same result. The much, and deservedly, maligned USNews contains all the predictive value held in the combination of USNews, RP and NMS.</p>
<p>So, if your main interest is in where your classmates are likely to go to prof school, then you can use the USNews, for up to date information that correlates very well with the WSJ, or figure that the WSJ does not change much, and use it.</p>
<p>RP and NMS are highly related (after all the schools with high NMS are like that because these sought after students choose to go there), and do not contribute to knowing where people go to prof school if you know USNews or WSJ. However, either might tell you which colleges are popular among top students.</p>
<p>Repeated using only the top 15 from Prestige's list. Here the multiple regression for predicting WSJ just misses significance (p=.06). So the high predictive value of these models is for the large differences between those at the top and the bottom of the full set of 27. Considering only the top universities, none of the predictors reaches significance for predicting WSJ, although they come close, and USNews is again the best.</p>
<p>Since all the factors are highly correlated, changing the weights does not have much effect on the overall ranking, but of course might be useful for a troll who wants to proclaim his/her favorite college is "better" than some other. </p>
<p>None of this tells which is the "best college", there is no such animal.</p>
<p>[EDIT i got the answer] ... interesting data btw...</p>
<p>Bananajamas,
You're right about accounting and marketing. Its mainly the finance industry, non-profits, and consulting that don't care.</p>
<p>Afan, WUSTL is another outlier, as it ranks among the top 15 in the USNWR but not among the top 30 national universities according to the WSJ.</p>