<p>In the case of Nobels, Putnams, etc. (higher education outcomes in general, for that matter) I don’t think anyone knows to what extent we are seeing one or the other effect. Some studies of post-graduate earnings have concluded that the college choice, per se, doesn’t matter (that differences are mostly selection not treatment effects).</p>
<p>goldenboy, the Rhodes scholarship is about as potent and indicator of academic quality as the nobel prize. It is awarded to 30 students annually. Schools like Oklahoma and Kansas State beat schools like Northwestern and Penn. You are free to start such a thread, but it would just be one of many on that very subject.</p>
<p>Actually the Nobel Prize is not really an award one can lobby for. The same cannot be said for most undegraduate/graduate awards. The school/staff that lobbies the best, will have the most awards.</p>
<p>I would argue that the undergraduate institution that a Nobel laureate attended is basically meaningless. Harvard certainly would have its fair share simply because it enrolls very promising individuals, but nobody is well-positioned for the Nobel prize based on undergraduate research/experience. In addition, these numbers are so small statistically - you think that because three individuals out of 200,000+ graduates won the pinnacle prize in their field that makes the whole institution better than a school wherein only 2 individuals won the prize? The takeaway I get is that you do NOT need to go to HYPSM to get a Nobel Prize and the vast majority of Nobel Laureates come from other institutions. Sounds like Alexandre is suggesting the same thing and I agree with this premise.</p>
<p>I think it would be more interesting to see that individuals with graduate degrees from the institutions. That, at least, may show some small inclination as the strength of the fields in the respective Graduate Schools of the university, although I still wouldn’t put much weight on it as view of the strength of the institution as a whole, particular at the undergrad level. But certainly more weight than where a Nobel Laureate went for undergraduate. I’d still expect to see Harvard at the top of masters/PhD students who have won a Nobel Prize.</p>
<p>rjkofnovi - you need to modify your statement to read “hasn’t been one single, solitary undergraduate.” I’d consider somebody who earned their masters or PhD still a graduate of the university. ;)</p>
<p>“Where did Nobel Prize winners complete their undergraduate education?”</p>
<p>So my remark was correct. However, I do agree with you that the graduate program is what really should be taken more into account than the undergrad one.</p>
<p>^I agree with bluedog. Not to mention these winners graduated from colleges long time ago. The professors that were in their classes had retired and might have even passed away. CC crowds are obssessed with rankings but this one is definitely among the most meaningless as far as what it means to undergrad education at the <em>present</em> time.</p>
<p>^ All the whiners complaining about the data as “meaningless” come from schools that don’t do too well.</p>
<p>Perhaps some LACs do well because they are selective and kids have a higher propensity to go into academic research. Schools that don’t do too well may have student bodies with a more pre-professional focus. Just some thoughts…</p>
<p>Not entirely true. You are nominated for Nobel consideration by one or more of your colleagues. You can lobby them to support you. Plus, its very common for scientists who have been nominated or who otherwise think they have published some Nobel-quality work to start going to all the Scandinavian scientific meetings and symposia, to make sure the Nobel voters know who they are and to repeatedly give scientific speeches and presentations about how significant and wonderful their ground-breaking discoveries are. </p>
<p>Back in the 80s and 90s Leroy Hood made so many trips over for scientific meetings, I’ll bet he had every hotel in Stockholm on speed dial. My guess is he has probably given up by now.</p>
<p>But I agree that honors received by alumni who attend a school 30 or 40 years ago is probably an unreliable measure of the school quality now. A better measure would be honors earned by current or recent students, such as recent Rhodes, Marshall, and Fulbright scholarships.</p>
<p>It always seems that the winners are so surprised that they won the prize. I just assumed they weren’t working on it full time like the other awards given to students.</p>
<p>Not everybody who wins lobbies. Plus, even the ones who do are probably surprised that it actually worked. And anyone who isn’t surprised probably knows enough to act surprised anyway.</p>
<p>There are some other prizes that are considered to be Nobel predictors, that if you win that prize then you have a good shot at getting a Nobel a few years later. In the biomedical field the Lasker Prize is a Nobel predictor. So if you win a Lasker you know to start your Nobel lobbying in earnest.</p>
<p>Don’t let Mini see the latest Fulbright list. He will promptly tell you that the record still pales when compared with Smith, when expressed on a per capita basis. Year after year, Smith jockeys with one of the Claremont College for the top billing. </p>
<p>NAME GRANTS APPLICATIONS
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor 29 148
Northwestern University 27 102
Yale University 26 122
Stanford University 25 93
University of Chicago 25 151
University of Washington 24 83
Columbia University 23 88
Boston College 21 73
Harvard University 20 107
Arizona State University 18 57</p>
<p>NAME GRANTS APPLICATIONS
Pitzer College 19 71
Smith College 19 40
Pomona College 15 76
Colgate University 9 31
Mount Holyoke College 9 40
Occidental College 9 51
Hamilton College 8 26
Saint Olaf College 8 21
Scripps College 8 38
Amherst College 7 39</p>
<p>“Don’t let Mini see the latest Fulbright list. He will promptly tell you that the record still pales when compared with Smith, when expressed on a per capita basis. Year after year, Smith jockeys with one of the Claremont College for the top billing.”</p>
<p>Of course you would be the one to beat him/her to it, right xiggi?-) ;-)</p>
<p>Haha, I guess that you are not unaware of my position regarding the Fulbright and some of the discussion I have had with Mini on the subject. Check the Smith forum for an "aper</p>
<p>Way to attack people’s objectivity. Northwestern has a Rhodes Scholar this year and I haven’t been going around to post that because I don’t believe Rhodes is that great of an indicator either; it’s too much of a crapshot to establish anything. But if you were to ask me, I believe Rhodes is far more related to undergrad experience today than Nobel. At least the professors that mentor or lecture the winners are still mentoring others and teaching the same classes that future students on CC may have the chance to take.</p>
<p>If you are so proud of those 11 alums that went to Berkeley ages ago and might be dead by now, I wonder if you are worried and disappointed with the fact that Berkeley has been doing poorly in producing Rhodes, Fulbright, Marshall, Cambridge Gates, Churchill winners in recent years, especially considering the sheer size of the student population. At least these winners are younger than you, unlike those 11 Nobel winners that may be older than your grandfather. Talking about living the past.</p>
<p>Making generalization about student bodies <em>today</em> based on few <em>old</em> winners out of thousands of alums is even more ridiculous. PhD per capita is the obvious measure but you probably don’t like that. Though not that I believe in using them to make generalizations, but I’d think Rhodes, Marshall, Fulbright, Cambridge Gates…would still be way better than using Nobel.</p>
<p>Oh, I don’t know. I am not much into equine sciences and horses, donkeys, or mules. </p>
<p>Actually, I first wrote “Year after year, Smith jockeys with one of the Claremont College for the top position.” but was pretty sure someone would want to point to the 1975 Smith centennial T-shirt “Smith College: A Century of Women on Top” and take the conversation into a different direction. </p>
<p>Sam, Nobel Prizes are for groundbreaking (usually lifelong) research. Rhodes, et al are for wealthy 20-somethings that happen to live in a particular region of the country and interview well.</p>