<p>99.99999% of people in general see the prestige of Cornell and Harvard as being equal, unattainable utopias of higher education. The other .0000001% that don't either do so because A) they work in academic fields where different research is being done at different places, or B) they have no friends and are very bitter/angry at being rejected from HYP. The quality of education at any top 50 uni (at least in undergraduate) will be very very similar if not the same. If you are indeed worried about US news rankings, please don't; the only people who do are HS seniors/parents of seniors, and people like muerteapablo who have a completely twisted view of what prestige/rankings mean.</p>
<p>^well said. and norcalguy put it best. if you're going to let these facts bother you, well, then you become a muerte. honestly, EVERYone i know thinks cornell's amazing. someone mentioned it as being seen as a community college!?!? in what universe??? Usually if people find out i will be attending they say, "ohhh wow, congratulations!" even my cousin at princeton and his friends think cornell's top-notch, especially in the sciences. I have a feeling that .00000001% tboone is talking about is primarily found around over-zealous teenagers and bitter adults, primarily CC'ers ;p</p>
<p>The point about dropping class size is valid. It is a fact that Cornell would be a top 10 school in USNWR if class sizes were smaller based on their current criteria. The reason Cornell climbed to 6 (when US News changed its criteria) was in part due to the fact that Cornell had dropped its class sizes and then the size went up again. It's financially complex, but in the end just requires more professors and the resources and space to support them. </p>
<p>Re: Acceptd's comment - I've studied at Harvard since graduating from Cornell, and realized that Cornell was a far superior undergraduate option for me personally. I felt the Harvard campus energy was very oppressive and the education was overrated. For what I studied, and the more rural / funky town setting Cornell offered, I would have chosen Cornell over Harvard, at least for undergrad. But, I didn't apply to Harvard. It didn't offer what I wanted to study.</p>
<p>I think people would be happy if Cornell were a 6-10 school instead of an 11-15. I don't think it's structured to be a top 5 school. </p>
<p>All this - I say - knowing full well that ranking an abstract experience like an education is absurd and I'm ashamed to even partake.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The reason Cornell climbed to 6 (when US News changed its criteria) was in part due to the fact that Cornell had dropped its class sizes and then the size went up again.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>It was mostly due to US News placing a heavy weighting on science funding, which is why Caltech went to No. 1 that year as well.</p>
<p>Re: class sizes, U.S. News actually dropped consideration of independent studies, tutorials, and thesis writing from consideration of 'class size' a couple years ago, which also hurt Cornell's standing. So I suppose those three one-on-one classes I had didn't really exist.</p>
<p>I can see it moving up, but hard to see it moving past WUSTL and Dartmouth. Anyway, where can you find these past US News Rankings?</p>
<p>
[quote]
The point about dropping class size is valid. It is a fact that Cornell would be a top 10 school in USNWR if class sizes were smaller based on their current criteria. The reason Cornell climbed to 6 (when US News changed its criteria) was in part due to the fact that Cornell had dropped its class sizes and then the size went up again. It's financially complex, but in the end just requires more professors and the resources and space to support them.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>It was because Cornell submitted wrong data that indicated it dropped its class sizes. It was corrected the following year and Cornell dropped back down again.</p>
<p>To paraphrase Randall Munroe, college rankings are like comparing apples to oranges....and oranges to racecars.</p>
<p>What you get out of a school is what you put into it, because while an Ivy league school may hire Nobel winners and Fields Medalists to teach intro Orgo and Real Analysis, they aren't the people being asked to learn, you are.</p>
<p>The only meaningful thing I can think of is the financial aid that a school offers, because honestly, regardless of how crappy or awesome a school is, education has become inordinately and unjustifiably expensive.</p>
<p>.....bump.........</p>
<p>bumpity bump</p>
<p>I'm a little late, but whatever.</p>
<p>
[quote]
99.99999% of people in general see the prestige of Cornell and Harvard as being equal, unattainable utopias of higher education. The other .0000001% that don't either do so because
[/quote]
</p>
<p>You've got to be kidding right? Harvard's prestige is not comparable to any school in the world. YPM and Oxbridge come the closest, but Harvard is simply the most prestigious school in the world.</p>
<p>Everyone knows what Harvard is, most people know what Cornell is. That's a significant difference. And almost no one considers them equal, not in name, research, or student quality. I imagine Cornell offers a better education though. </p>
<p>Seriously, this type of delusion is sad. Have pride in Cornell and it's well deserved. But don't put Cornell and its name in a category where it simply doesn't belong. </p>
<p>It's like the NBA. Is everyone there in an incredibly exclusive category of basketball talent? Of course. Even look at the very best players. That's even more amazingly exclusive. But no one in their right mind would say Scottie Pippen is equivalent to Michael Jordan.</p>
<p>"And almost no one considers them equal, not in name, research, or student quality."</p>
<p>So even though Harvard doesn't offer my major, they are better than Cornell at it?
Employers hire based on the strength of candidate and the strength of the school they went to <strong><em>in that given subject area</em></strong> Overall, Harvard is more prestigious than Cornell and does have ample programs that are stronger than similar programs at Cornell. But conversely, Cornell has programs that top Harvard's and, more importantly for a person in my situation, Cornell offers programs that Harvard does not offer. I would imagine the education would be better for whichever institution an individual is most fit for.</p>
<p>I am going to offer an equally baseless claim as yours. Only 25% of the US population has a bachelors degree. Probably less than .01% have a bachelors degree from a top 25 University. I think anyone that has a Cornell degree receives equal praise as someone who has a Cornell degree in the real world. A Cornell grad may have less job opportunities right out of UG, and Cornell may do less research than Harvard, but the amount of research one's school does rarely if ever affects the individual. Harvard may indeed provide a higher quality educational experience, but the respect one earns specifically from their degree in social functions/areas (IE, how much their ego is stroked) will be the same in 99 out of 100 cases between any Ivy league grad (except penn, but only because people confuse penn with penn state; penn is a great school). If a dartmouth grad and myself are hitting on a girl at a party, and for some stupid reason I pull out my Cornell diploma and say, "look, Im a cornell grad", and then my friend pulls out his dartmouth degree and says, "look, im a Dartmouth grad" the girl is not going to say, "well, the quality of undergraduate attention AND the quality of social science research is much greater at Dartmouth, so I choose you, Dartmouth grad". (rather, she will be sickened by the resume battle between to pompous asses and leave). Rather, this girl would not care, because Cornell and Dartmouth seem equally "prestigious" to her (stupid, grossly unrealistic example, I know, but it gets my point across). The other day, I told this girl in my class that I was accepted ED to Cornell, and her exact words were "ooohh!, so prestigious" and she shivered (because she herself is a prestige whore, but she is going to UIC)</p>
<p>I agree with Cayuga Red. The massive shift in the economic structure of the world that we are experiencing will result in greater demand and prestige for Cornell. Much of the prestige granted to HYP by society is a result of their prominance in fields such as law ,banking and Finance. As we move away from our late stage rentier economy the usefullness of such vocations will become apparent and an education in real skills will become more in demand. When this happens Cornell will be better positioned in the World than nearly any other university. In addition the reputation of Cornell Alums as tougher, more independent and hardier than the alums of the rest of the ivies will go far in the "future".</p>
<p>It seems to me that the only way anyone has any business comparing Ivy league schools is to attend both for undergrad with the same work ethic and the same major with no pollution of prior experience in each case.</p>
<p>Because, that's the only way you would strip the (definite) factor of the individual student away from the (alleged) inherent differences in the schools.</p>
<p>And that s hit's impossible, so this is a dumb topic to get all riled up about.</p>
<p>Now, what we CAN do is compare their athletic teams.
And I think we can all agree that while Dartmouth's students that attend games are top notch (live octopus thrown on hockey rink, anyone?), their athletic teams themselves are
...
Well..</p>
<p>Junk.</p>
<p>Cornell has several instate issues which are decrements to its rank: 1) the contract colleges matriculate a lot of New Yorkers, which limits the OOS test scores; 2) the contract colleges mean that (state) Finaid is a much different animal than the other well-endowed Ivies, and even other privates -- Vandy just went 100% no-loan; 3) undergrad biz programs mean nothing in the 'pretige' realm, since most of Cornell's ranking competitors do not offer undergrad biz; 4) contract colleges mean high transfer rates in comparison with other top 20 schools (transfer rates not considered a good thing by presige hounds); 5) being rural, like Dartmouth, limits faculty recruitment, particularly to those who need to be near a city (for whatever reason) -- some Dartmouth faculty reside in the Boston environs and commute to Hanover.....</p>
<p>I'm sure there's a better way to get at this question. If you're serious about estimating whether Cornell will go up and down, this would involve looking at how US News indexes scores:</p>
<p>(1) Peer assessment (25%)
(2) Acceptance rate (1.5%)
(3) HS Class Standing (6%)
(4) SAT Scores (7.5%)
(5) Faculty Compensation (7%)
(6) % Faculty with Terminal Deg (3%)
(7) % FT Faculty (1%)
(8) S/F Ratio (1%)
(9) Class Size 1-19 (6%)
(10) Class Size 50+ (2%)
(11) Grad Rate (16%)
(12) Freshman Retention (4%)
(13) Endowment (10%)
(14) Alumni Giving (5%)
(15) Grad Rate adjusted for priors (5%)</p>
<p>And then ask, how much more/less is Cornell exposed to the recession, and how will it affect these metrics vis a vis its neighbors on the rankings? Eg I know Cornell plans to let the faculty shrink and the student population increase of the next years, which means larger S/F ratio, and likely larger classes, relatively higher admit rate, adverse selection on SAT/GPA scores, etc. What about the schools ranked +3/-3 from Cornell? Seriously, this does not mean comparing Cornell's situation with Harvard's. </p>
<p>Many observations, such as the organizational traits that affect Cornell's ranking <em>now</em>, will likely still have the same effect in the future, and so won't greatly affect Cornell's rank. Other factors, such as the commitments to financial aid regimes, or Cayuga's argument about Cornell's ability to teach skills that will be viewed as more fashionable than those of Cornell's peers, will be affected by the recession, and will in turn affect rankings. </p>
<p>Not that rankings should be what we should be foremost worried about, but at least it would be staying on the OP's topic.</p>
<p>The only places that would really improve their rankings in any meaningful way but cutting down the size of the incoming class are the big state schools that have to take too many less qualified students.</p>
<p>For instance, most of Michigan's programs are ranked very highly, but they also have to fill thousands and thousands of dorm rooms.</p>
<p>This is also why, say, Harvard can't just build a skyscraper dormitory to put all of the would-have-beens in.</p>
<p>I don't care where Cornell is heading, all i know that it is the perfect place for me, provides a world class education, and has everything that I could ever imagine!</p>
<p>^ And also Collegetown Bagels.........</p>
<p>Sesame seed bagel with cream cheese, kettle chips (original), ginger beer (the one 'brewed' in Ithaca)...</p>
<p>So, you eat the chips WITH creamcheese from your bagel, finish them, and then polish off half of your ginger beer. Eat your bagel, wash it down with the remaining ginger beer.
You will be happy.</p>
<p>cornell could be strengthened IF the university had an undergraduate facility in NYC...</p>