And once again, my alltime favorite ranking system. Be sure to refresh it several times to get the full understanding of this fabulous tool: http://www.rankyourcollege.com/ddmethod.html
“HS guidance counselors are another story. I suspect they could be influenced somewhat by marketing literature, although I more strongly suspect they are much more influenced by both preconceptions on the one end and stories they hear back from recent graduates on the other.”
Like anyone really believes that HS counselors (outside of those at elite private high schools and at a handful of affluent suburban prep and public magnet schools) have any clue whatsoever about the majority of these colleges and universities? Please. This is all simply “I’ve heard of, or I know someone I like who went there, so it must be good.”
Hmmm… NYU is only #32? I’m annoyed and perplexed that USNWR doesn’t give any weighting to my IFII: “Irrational Financial Immolation Index”
“I have Harvey Mudd and Rice Tshirts. I wear them when I work out.”
Why did I not think, during my dating days, to wear such attire at the gym? Powerful bait, no doubt.
One of the key problems of the US News rankings is that they are using the same metrics to consider every single ranked University. If they were to segregate into tiers of colleges by the selectivity numericals (avg SATs, acceptance rate, yield rate, etc.) and then use factors most relevant to the specific tier to rank colleges, it would be a lot more accurate. However, that is a lot of work…
I think they do a pretty good job of ranking given they are ranking such a wide group of schools. There will obviously be some shaking up within schools close by (#4 might be better than #2, etc.), but that is to be expected when there are so many schools being ranked on the same metrics. The rankings do a pretty good job on determining the overall quality of schools, and provide a ball park estimate of how a school ranks relative to its peers.
I completely agree @Pizzagirl but I didn’t give them a voice in the rankings. USNWR did. Yell at them, not me. :))
I should have added though, that their most powerful influence probably comes from whichever schools happen to be close by, after the HYPS schools. Maybe that was covered under preconceptions.
Hmmm… I’ll have to ask my DH how he feels when I wear these shirts… if I am “shopping” for brains and brawn? Heck, he’s just happy if I drag myself to the gym at all.
I doubt that the opinion of public school guidance counselors is a useful metric, since almost none of them develop deep enough relationships with any of their hundreds of assigned students such that a kid would ever actually come back and visit his GC, much less share meaningful information about a given school. It might be different for private school GC’s, but I would think students would be more likely to return to visit a favorite high school teacher and chat with him or her than with a GC, unless that student had had some atypical issues during his stay that the GC needed to help him with.
Oops- timed out above. DH and I have a rule-- look, don’t touch 
They’ll rank high the schools they’ve heard of.
As for the peer poll… it’s the same thing as the Olympics figure skating scoring during the Cold War. Everyone votes for their buddy.
Actually, the HS GCs I’ve known, even at non-elite and gasp urban public HSs, are a pretty conscientious bunch, and generally know a lot about colleges—they might not know all of them, but they can tell you the basics about, say, Wittenberg (to pick a semi-random obscure-for-where-I-live—Alaska—school) if asked.
That said, do I think GC ratings are useful? Absolutely not. But do give the profession a bit of credit where it’s due.
@pizzagirl “In my Midwestern neck of the woods, Michigan has more man on the street prestige than half the colleges in the top 20.”
In my experience, Michigan grads are often a lot like Duke grads. In their minds their school not just a good school, it is the #1 school, and they can’t understand why that isn’t obvious to everyone else. Both schools have a strong culture and alumni network. If you want to be entertained, just suggest to a Michigan grad that Northwestern might be a better school and see how that goes. lol
The Onion has it all figured out:
http://www.theonion.com/graphic/how-us-news-ranks-colleges-33959
That is great, @doschicos. I think they cracked the actual code, not that pap USNWR tries to feed us in the magazine.
The very fact that we are discussing the USNWR ranking, its correctness or otherwise, indicates our interest in finding out ‘who ranks where’! I am pretty sure, many of us would like to brag about our children going to Ivy league or Private Universities (the ones perceived as Ivy equivalent) within the respective social circle. At the same time, I have come across many parents who feel very agitated to find their children from these ‘big name’ schools not getting the ‘most favoured’ status when it comes to employment. Having said that, let me add that we will keep talking about the ranks and try to push our children for the ones in the “Top 15” and bask in the glory if they are able to get admission to one of these ‘hallowed’ few.
“’! I am pretty sure, many of us would like to brag about our children going to Ivy league or Private Universities (the ones perceived as Ivy equivalent) within the respective social circle”
Nope, not really. Of all my neighbors probably only 2 of them even know where my kids went to school. My coworkers know. My friends know, and their kids go to a mix of elite and non elite schools and we are all happy for one another equally. Some of us in my social circle have also been through enough life tragedies that we know how fortunate we are to have healthy kids in the first place.
I know a number of folks who have kids attending Ivies or similar and none of these people brag about it. It’s just where their kid goes to school.
Exactly.
Some formerly regional, or commuter schools that have risen in the ranks show a lot of love for US News.
If the powers that be tweaked the ranking system and those same schools sunk back in the rankings, they would be hating US News and scrub it from their promotional materials.
Here’s a serious question: how do people actually use this list, and other similar lists? Are there really people who are making decisions on where to apply based on small differences in list placement? At the extreme, is there really anybody in this land who would choose Princeton over Harvard based on the USNews ranking? If, on the other hand, people are just using it to get some rough idea about tiers and comparables, well, OK, I guess.
[Note: I realize there are people who will choose Princeton over Harvard. But I doubt if the USNews ranking would play a role in any such decision.]