USNWR Rankings - The Metrics

College Search & Selection
281

<p>“Btw, for the non-academic aspect (fit) of college selection, compared to what a student can find at a major public vs any of the Ivies, I actually like the major public’s non-classroom advantages. In many cases, the differences can be quite large, resulting in much higher quality of life for the undergraduate student. I have often argued that this element of college life, representing 150+ hours per week out of the classroom, is not sufficiently weighed by prospective college students”</p>

<p>Perhaps that was hawkette’s experience at tOSU?</p>

282

<p>Why is Hawkette mentioning Ohio State in the same sentence as Michigan without talking about football?</p>

283

<p>UCBChE, you really have to stop getting in the way of my fun!</p>

<p>ha!</p>

<p>

</p>

284

<p>"I’ll let you do the work for Caltech and U Michigan, but the Harvard numbers for student/faculty ratio come from USWNR. A quick check of their 2008-09 CDS reveals in Section I that they count their undergrad students (6671) against their faculty (988) for a calculated ratio of Student/Faculty Ratio of 7/1. </p>

<p>In further inspection of the USNWR data, you will also find that Harvard has a complete faculty size of 1712 full-time professors and another 410 part-time for a faculty total of 2212. My interpretation is that the difference between 988 and 2212 has to do with the allocation to graduate programs, professional programs and the partial counting of the part-time professors. </p>

<p>Do you interpret it differently?"</p>

<p>Hawkette, let us just go with the CDS numbers. The USNWR numbers are not accurate. And I am not sure what work is required here. It takes three minutes to get the numbers I requested:</p>

<p>Caltech:
312 Faculty
913 Students
3:1 ratio</p>

<p><a href=“http://finance.caltech.edu/budget/cds2008.pdf[/url]”>http://finance.caltech.edu/budget/cds2008.pdf&lt;/a&gt; (page 34)</p>

<p>Harvard:
988 Faculty
6671 Students
7:1 ratio</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_CDS2008_2009_Harvard_for_Web_Clean.pdf[/url]”>http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_CDS2008_2009_Harvard_for_Web_Clean.pdf&lt;/a&gt; (page 23)</p>

<p>Michigan:
2257 Faculty
34,069 students
15:1 ratio</p>

<p><a href=“Office of Budget and Planning”>Office of Budget and Planning; (Section I page 2)</p>

<p>According to the CDS, the “Student to Faculty Ratio” should be calculated as follows:</p>

<p>“Report the Fall 2007 ratio of full-time equivalent students (full-time plus 1/3 part time) to full-time equivalent instructional faculty (full time plus 1/3 part time). In the ratio calculations, exclude both faculty and students in stand-alone graduate or professional programs such as medicine, law, veterinary, dentistry, social work, business, or public health in which faculty teach virtually only graduate-level students. Do not count
undergraduate or graduate student teaching assistants as faculty.”</p>

<p>It would seem that Michigan, most public universities and MIT intepret the above to include graduate students enrolled in the colleges of Arts and Sciences and Engineering. That would explain why Michigan included approximately 8,000 graduate students in its calculation of the student to faculty ratio. On the other hand, most private universities, including Caltech and Harvard, did not include graduate students. With graduate student bodies that outnumber undergraduate students 2:1, I think this can cause a great deal of confusion don’t you? If you include graduate students enrolled in the colleges of arts and sciences and engineering alone, Caltech’s ratio jumps to 9:1 and Harvard’s to 13:1 or 14:1.</p>

<p>Would you say this is a fair statement Hawkette?</p>

285

<p>A comment on using College Baseball as a reason for the student to attend a college in order to get the “well-rounded” full experience.</p>

<p>College Baseball is great, but, by far, the most fun and exiciting part of College Baseball are the Regionals, Super Regionals and College World Series.</p>

<p>and when are these held?</p>

<p>they are mostly held AFTER the spring semester is completed and the student is long gone to his/her summer job or back home.</p>

<p>In addition, unless you are in the top 8 schools, you rarely have a home game during the SuperRegional stage and never during the World Series stage.</p>

286

<p>“If you graduated from U Michigan in 1996, that means you started in 1991, ie, almost 19 years ago. Okay, you’re right—it’s not two decades….I guess that extra year makes you au courant on what it’s like to be choosing a college in today’s America and going thru freshmen year.”</p>

<p>I started in the fall of 1992. But Hawkette, your original statement was that I had not been a student at Michigan in 2 decades, not that I had not been a Freshmen at Michigan in 2 decades. Why would it make a difference? I was as observant as a senior as I was as a Freshman.</p>

<p>“Times change. And so do schools. Some move up, some move down and still others fall behind by standing still.”</p>

<p>Absolutely Hawkette, Michigan has from from not being among the 15 wealthiest universities in the US to being the 6th wealthiest university in the US. And Michigan has gone from not being among the 30 most selective universities in the nation to being the 24th most selective university in the nation. Clearly, universities change over time, if only fractionally. But in Michigan’s case, all the data points to Michigan improving over time.</p>

<p>"that’s a great one. As we both know, there haven’t been any updated rankings released since before that time (1993?). Haha. Very good. U Michigan has maintained its rankings for 17 straight years!!! Very funny stuff. "</p>

<p>Hawkette, the USNWR updates its rankings annually.</p>

287

<p>Alexandre, excellent analysis and frankly, I am a little surprised at the differences in using or not using graduate students in the ratio.</p>

<p>this could very well be why the Student/faculty ratio only counts as 1% of the USNWR rankings, whereas the <20 and >50 class sizes combined count for 8%.</p>

288

<p>JohnsAdams, in many cases where graduate students are few, the ratio will not be seriously altered. But in some cases where graduate students outnumber undergrads, the ratio can seriously be enhanced by leaving graduate students out of the equation. </p>

<p>Class sizes are also manipulated by the way. I don’t have time to go over it now, but I will in the next day or two. </p>

<p>For now, all I can say is that common data sets and university stats are seldom audited and are not at all standardized. As such, comparing institutions with vastly different approaches to data reporting is often misleading.</p>

289

<p>It seems the confusion is over the definition of “stand alone” graduate programs. Some schools interpret it to include graduate arts and sciences. Some don’t. </p>

<p>Regardless, we’re talking about a ratio. It has two parts.
So, however a school interprets “stand alone”, it should apply the interpretation consistently to exclude both graduate students and faculty, or to include both graduate students and faculty. Harvard apparently excludes both graduate students and graduate faculty; Michigan apparently includes both. If the end result of these varying practices matters, does it favor the private schools or the public schools? Do graduate schools of arts and science not tend to have better S:F ratios than undergraduate schools? How many 100-student classes does the average graduate school of arts and sciences have?</p>

290

<p>Alex,
USWNR does not make up the data that they report. It is provided to them by the schools. </p>

<p>I think you’re being quick and a little reckless in accusing Harvard of lying and data manipulation. The data lead me to a different conclusion. </p>

<p>Here are the facts for Harvard.</p>

<p>19,230 = Total # of undergraduate and graduate students</p>

<p>6678, 35% = no. of undergraduate students and % of overall student body
3738, 19% = no. of graduate students not in standalone graduate or professional programs and % of overall student body
8814, 46% = no. of graduate students in standalone graduate or professional programs and % of overall student body</p>

<p>2122 = Total # of Full-time and Part-time Faculty</p>

<p>1712 = no. of Full-time Faculty
410 = no. of Part-time Faculty
1849 = Total # of Faculty after applying only 1/3 credit for a part-time prof</p>

<p>in CDS, Harvard reports their Student/Faculty ratio as follows:
6678 = no. of students to be included in calculation
988 = no. of faculty to be included in calculation</p>

<p>7/1 = Student/Faculty Ratio </p>

<p>IMO Harvard is presenting an undergraduate student/faculty ratio and has used an undergraduate faculty count in their calculation. </p>

<p>If you increase the student count to include undergrads and non-standalone grad programs, this also likely results in an indeterminate increase in the faculty count. But even if you left the faculty count unchanged, the worst-case scenario, the S/F ratio would be 10.5/1, not the 13/1 or 14/1 that you claim.</p>

291

<p>Hawkette thank you for providing statistics and your own knowledge, perhaps this will enlighten many cc users that UMich is not close to being a peer of Harvard or any Ivy League school.</p>

292

<p>Hawkette, the faculty count has been made by Harvard in the CDS. The faculty number that qualifies for consideration according to CDS rules is 988. That is not open for debate. The remaining faculty belong to the Law school, HBS and other stand-along programs. They are not to be counted. The link below clearl shows that Harvard’s faculty in Arts and Sciences and Engineering is no more than 1,000.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_09_18-19facuni.pdf[/url]”>http://www.provost.harvard.edu/institutional_research/Provost_-_09_18-19facuni.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Now I did not actually verify the exact number of graduate students who should be counted. I will admit as much. Frankly, I find the the number 3,700 that you provide above a little low. I imagined that Harvard had some 14,000 graduate students, and of those, I estimated that at least 4,000 should be included, more like 5,000 or more. Either way, if included, the student to faculty ratio would be over 10:1, which is admittedly still excellent and insignificantly higher than 7:1, but it is still higher.</p>

<p>The point I am making Hawkette, is that the CDS clearly calls for graduate students enrolled on non stand-alone programs to be included and most private universities, not just Harvard, fail to do so. This gives them the appearance of having more favorable student to faculty ratios. Most private elites claim ratios of 3:1 - 8:1. In reallity, it should be more like 7:1 and above. In many cases, over 10:1.</p>

293

<br>

<br>

<p>I don’t see the number on the Harvard GSAS pages, but according to the admissions page, about 685 students are admitted each year. They awarded 354 PhDs and 66 master’s degrees last month (May, 2010). So 3,700 does not look way low to me.</p>

294

<p>GSAS does not include the school of Engineering, which has an additional 400 graduate students. At any rate, even if it is 3,700 GSAS students and 400 Engineering students with 988 faculty, the ratio works out to 11:1, which slightly higher than 7:1 listed in Harvard’s CDS and in the USNWR.</p>

295

<p>Caltech has a simiular senario. Its has a faculty of 318 and lists its student to faculty ratio as 3:1. If the included their graduate students, it the ratio would increase to 7:1. </p>

<p>Most private universities exclude graduate students from their calculations, making their student to faculty ratio appear lower than it actually is.</p>

296

<p>And why is it important to count the grad students in the student to faculty ratio when we are talking about undergrads here? I am seriously asking.</p>

297

<p>^^^It’s all about consistancy, obviously!</p>

298

<p>fallenchemist, graduate students study under the same faculty as undergrads and commend arguably more of the faculty’s time. As such, it is only fair to include graduate students in the calculation of student to faculty ratios. </p>

<p>Also, as rjk points out, it is about consistancy. The CDS asks schools to only exlude graduate students enrolled in stand alone programs.</p>

299

<p>well, I can agree with the consistancy part to the extent that it is nice to have it and it obviously doesn’t exist in much of data no matter where it is reported, but as a former grad student myself, I rather disagree with the point about faculty time per se. Most grad students only take courses for a year or two and then it is all research, so from the point of view of classroom time (by that I mean having to take up the profs time with questions about classes, not that they are in the same classes as undergrads for the most part) you couldn’t count them all. As far as taking up their time to discuss their research, that argues more that all big time research universities are not as undergrad devoted as those that are not, not about some ratio of grad students between those big time research universities, which is a moot point for the most part. A prof at a university that is mostly about big time grad programs isn’t going to change his focus because he has 5 grad students or 15, he is still going to be busy writing grant proposals and papers for publication and the like. The more big time the program and the bigger the group, the more likely he is to have post-docs that take a lot of that load of writing the draft papers and proposals.</p>

<p>My point is that no undergrad is going to learn anything from a faculty ratio of 7:1 or 15:1, what they need to understand is the “culture” of that university towards undergrads vs. being focused on everything but. Arguing about these ratios and their consistency or lack thereof and counting grad students or not is a waste of time and misses the point. Of course, most of this discussion has been a waste of time and misses the point, IMHO, but hey. Have fun.</p>

300

<p>Alex,
The 3738 number of graduate students is what Harvard reported to collegeboard.com</p>

<p>[College</a> Search - Harvard College - At a Glance](<a href=“College Search - BigFuture | College Board”>College Search - BigFuture | College Board)</p>