<p>There has always been a large debate over the USNWR and any other college ranking system for that matter. I see a lot of people criticizing the methodology of rankings, so my question to you is what would you factor in? I'm particularly curious concerning which objective factors you find to be most important (rentention rate, etc.).
Personally, I feel that other factors (prestiege, for example) are too hard to rank and can throw off rankings. Other things I would consider more are average salary, salary growth potential, and rates of grad acceptances vs. unemployment.</p>
<p>Pretend that its your job to compile the next important college ranking. What do you do?</p>
<p>SAT scores. Especially math SAT scores. You don't need much else. The other things that matter are too difficult to ascertain. There are other things that are interesting because they address personal preferences, like size and location. For majors like art and and music, SATs may not apply. Then you go with reputation, success of graduates, and so on.</p>
<p>Leadership positions held by and achievements of living alumni- Number of Heads of State, Supreme Court justices, Cabinet Positions, US Senate members, Governors , Ambassadors, Fortune 100 CEO's (of non-bankrupt or non governement bailed-out firms), successful US Presidents (top 20 as rated by CNN historians), pulitzer, nobel, and emmy winners (graduates with the most of these awards).</p>
<p>Percentage of students living on campus. In a quality college experience, as much of the learning opportunity should occur outside the classroom as in. Students who have to make intentional trips to campus to become part of the campus community don't add as much to that opportunity. The difference between a residential campus and one with a large commuter population is the same difference between an immediate family that's all under one roof, and an extended family that only gets together for special occasions.</p>
<p>Not everyone would care about this, but I'd look at the % of undergrads who do research with faculty.</p>
<p>I wouldn't go with average salary...a school that produces a lot of professors, for example, would lose out. ;)</p>
<p>I actually think that the best ranking would be an interactive site where people could choose which factors they care about from a comprehensive list and assign weightings to them, and get a customized result. I've seen a simple version of that for grad schools (though I don't think it has the weighting feature), but I don't know if it exists for undergrad.</p>