I thought decisions were coming out tomorrow. Are they actually coming out on the 26th?
Yet, harry133 complains about grade deflation at Vanderbilt?
QS World University Ranking is suspect to say the least.
Penn State and Ohio State ranked far higher than University of Virginia, Vanderbilt, Dartmouth, Notre Dame, Georgetown, etc?
University of Colorado ranked higher than Dartmouth and Notre Dame?
Arizona State ranked higher than Georgetown and Tufts?
University of Colorado at Denver ranked higher than Wake Forest and Boston College?
QS World University Rankings and all other Global rankings are throw away rankings, because in order to compare universities across borders the criteria in the ranking methodology is next to useless. Global rankings are inherently biased towards larger universities and boost their home countries rankings. Surprise, surprise 4 of the top 10 are UK universities. Wonder where QS World Rankings is located?
‘Academic Citations’ which are 20%! of the ranking are gamed like heck by some universities, because it is the number of citations per faculty member rather than the quality of the citations, so one professor’s 10 garbage citations is ranked 10x above another professor’s 1 brilliant research citation.
Even look at USNews Global Rankings and you will see the order of US universities is different than USNews very own US rankings, because they have to use dumbed down criteria to compare across borders. Is Duke the #22 US University per US News Global or the #10 US University per US News U.S.? Is Northwestern #24 or #9 in the same country? Same ranking service, yet a different order of universities for the same country!
I guess the Ivies didn’t like Vanderbilt in their orange box up there. LOL
So much for the ‘Harvard of the South’ nickname!
Or… perhaps it changed as their date isn’t the same.
You don’t need to list examples “i.e. Brown…” if you list all 8 !!
Since I am quarantined and got bored, I wanted to leave some notes for people who are nervosly waiting for the result.
First of all, I am class of 2022 in school of engineering majoring in computer science.
- I do not really think if interview really means something? I guess it can help you if u r not really qualified for vandy in terms of score(exam, gpa, etc) Because I did not even give an effort to contact interviewer (I did not do interview with Vandy) , and still got in.
- In my opinion Vanderbilt really values test scores and gpa, and it is a valid assumption because our former chancellor who just retired was eager to bring ranking up. He started to accept tons of Asian students with high exam score, and it really helped! (My specs are: ACT: 34; SAT2 800 on chem, physics, math2, chinese; AMC12 perfect score; USAMO 14/42, etc)
- So far I think Vandy is fine but feel ■■■■ because who likes their own school?
- Vandy has huge deflation so if u value ur gpa dont come
- It is really hard to get into first tier residential college so if u want to live in a good dorm room I would not consider Vandy as an option because u cant really live off campus (u have to apply and hard to get accepted). I am in the first tier residential college so I am happy.
- Btw I am an international student(Asian) studying STEM, so dont think that u cannot get in just because your specs are worse than mine.
- If u have any question ask me I will answer any questions. Btw I am working as an high school consultant
@CALMom65 They switched Vanderbilt and Stanford with the two ivies that were missing haha
@paigezz LOL love it!! 
As far as USNWR domestic rankings, and since harry133 is studying a STEM field, I will note Vandy’s engineering school is ranked #39, and in grad schools, their CS program is ranked #58, Math is #44, and Physics is #52 - just to give e general idea. They are much stronger in non-STEM fields.
UK has some great schools that arguably deserve to be named among the top 10 in the world, but yes, all rankings, including domestic ones, are basically just glorified opinions that do not necessarily translate into a useful tool for picking a school from a student’s standpoint.
“In the 2000 rankings U.S. News standardized all variables in its ranking model, a procedure that catapulted CalTech into #1, displacing first-ranked Harvard, Princeton and Yale. The following year, after a hefty dose of criticism from baffled readers, including some from the displaced Ivies themselves, U.S. News adjusted each school’s research spending according to the ratio of its undergraduate to graduate students and applied a logarithmic adjustor to deal with “so-called statistical outliers.” CalTech (the statistical outlier) was pushed back into fourth, and Harvard, Princeton and Yale were back on top.” (Running to Stay in Place: The Stability of U.S. News’ Ranking System)
However, those that throw around such subjective terms as “elite” should not be surprised they are referred to rankings, such as they are.
After all, person A may think you are only “elite” if you medaled at an international academic olympiad while person B may think you are only truly “elite” if your ancestors came on the Mayflower.
And yeah… that’s now how things work:-)
@harry133 Vandy CS or UIUC CS?
UIUC CS
UIUC CS but Vandy for literally everything else, IMO.
Don’t get too stressed out, everyone! Coming from a freshman at Vandy with completely not spectacular stats- 33 ACT, 4.87 weighted GPA…but only about a 3.6 UW (and Vandy saw both!). It’s really a random game. A year from now, wherever you end up, you aren’t going to be thinking about the colleges you didn’t get into
Tomorrow at 5
Vandy is tomorrow at 5 pm CST!!
How do you know?
UIUC for CS!
they sent out an email
The admissions office just sent an email.
Super nervous and super excited! Good luck to all!