What are the general perceptions of WashU?

College Search & Selection
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<p>I think we’ve seen plenty of discussion on this forum that support the notion that PA in the USNWR methodology can be skewed or manipulated and is only marginally trustworthy as a measure of excellence. </p>

<pre><code>USNWR is one evaluation methodology. Here’s another look at measuring the quality of American research universities and in it, WUSTL stands among the best. IOW, this does reflect WUSTL high stature as a research university. Just looking at the private research universities (page 12 of the report), there is a list of ten that score the highest, that is, have the highest number of quality measures at the top.
</code></pre>

<p>The ten are, not in alphabetical order: Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Columbia, Chicago, Duke, Penn, Northwestern, WUSTL, and Yale. </p>

<p>The next group includes: Caltech, JHU, Cornell, Emory, Vanderbilt and NYU. </p>

<p>This study puts a lot of weight on research funding, but also includes eight other categories measuring student quality and faculty quality. They are grouped according to overall scores, not numerically ranked as in USNWR. The emphasis on research does favor public universities and privates with big research budgets over privates that don’t, which is why Princeton, Dartmouth and Brown don’t show up in the first two groups. </p>

<p>see rest at: <a href=“http://mup.asu.edu/research2008.pdf[/url]”>http://mup.asu.edu/research2008.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>So, without the subjective and oft-discredited PA score, the USNWR ranking score for WUSTL is not very different from the MUP study.</p>

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<p>The technique of asking industry leaders to rate their peer competitors is a commonly accepted practice. </p>

<p>PA is a subjective score. The subjective tendencies tend to be weeded out when you survey a vast number of academians… if you take a look at the macro scale of things…</p>

<p>When you get a statistically significant response from respected members of the higher education community… the higher sample size will legitimize the results… If the subjective opinion of a vast number of academics think Princeton is no. 1… then Princeton is probably no. 1! Simple as that.</p>

<p>46% is considered a very good response rate for a mail survey like the USNews’ PA survey.</p>

<p>A high response rate is the key to legitimizing a survey’s results. When a survey elicits responses from a large percentage of its target population, the findings are seen as more accurate. </p>

<p>Low response rates, on the other hand, can damage the credibility of a survey’s results, because the sample is less likely to represent the overall target population.</p>

<p>It’s also been proven that PA scores can be accurately predicted by figures already present in the USNews rankings.</p>

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<p>[Let</a> me google that for you](<a href=“http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Most+dangerous+cities+2009]Let”>http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Most+dangerous+cities+2009)</p>

<p>st Louis isn’t even in the top 15 of cities with the highest crime per 100,000 people. A monkey could have googled that and gotten his facts straight before logging onto a forum and talking about something he knows absolutely nothing about.</p>

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<p>[St</a>. Louis tops dangerous U.S. cities - Crime & courts- msnbc.com](<a href=“http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15475741/]St”>http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15475741/)</p>

<p>That’s from 2006, so it not be in the top spot now. It’s still not that nice of a city though.</p>

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<p>Wow great rebuttal, I forfeit.</p>

66

<p>hahahahahahaha me too sorry about that</p>

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<p>Wow, I just reread my post and realized how stupid that sounded, sorry. St. Louis isn’t a great city, but Wash U’s in one of the best parts of it. I was just trying to point out that calling him dumber than a monkey for saying that St. Louis was the most dangerous city in the country was a little harsh.</p>

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<p>Haha yeah I got carried away. I apologize, and I understand your point as well, thanks.</p>

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<p>When you put the “might” that should have been in the post in there, remarkably, it makes a little sense.</p>