However according to USNEWS:
“There are 280 National Universities – 173 public, 100 private and seven for-profit – based on the categories established by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching”
and
“There are 249 National Liberal Arts Colleges – 221 private, 27 public and one for-profit.”
and
" Of the 620 Regional Universities, 262 are public, 346 are private and 12 are for-profit."
So only about less than 1200 colleges are ranked in USNEWS. What happened to other schools?
Also,
which ranking website is better do you think?
USNEWS
Forbes
Princeton Review
Money’s Best
etc etc…
^ ^ ^ ^
Maybe, if the institution receives a specific USN&WR ranking-number/u. Moreover, what you and I might define as “decent” obviously may not meet others’ criteria.
We used the big Princeton Review book and really liked it. Still I think you should take all these rankings rather lightly. Of course you want to go to a good school, but all the factors that make a school right for you personally are far more important than any rank, in my opinion. However if a school was not listed at all, in Princeton Review for example, then yes I would question the quality a bit. Not to say that I would absolutely rule that school out, but I would at least want to know why it didn’t make the cut.
They may omit a lot of the more highly specialized schools. Schools like Devry and ITT Technical Institute are four year schools, but the students going there are basically all going for some type of computer science, computer programming, networking, etc. There are also many schools that exclusively specialize in fine arts (painting, drawing, sculpture, etc) or other subjects like dance, music, and other types of performance arts. These schools offer four year degrees, but they wouldn’t logically fit on the same list as big universities. At a university there are history majors, physics majors, sociology majors, music majors, gender studies majors, and so many more. There are a lot of highly specialized technical schools like this that wouldn’t really fit into the same list as the schools in the USNews rankings.
One of my good friends got her bachelor’s in fine arts from a tiny school in the Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota area. It’s called the College of Visual Arts, and it has a total enrollment of only about 200 people. All of the students there were going for drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, fashion design, and a few other related subjects. The school itself is an old mansion that was converted into a college. It was really a very cool place. It was like a more contemporary version of Hogwarts.
Each ranking system has a methodology section where they explain which variables they are counting and how they weigh each one. Choose the system that ranks variables in the way most consistent with your opinion of their value.
If a college needed to have a 25 average to be ranked, most colleges wouldn’t be ranked.
Or, if a college needed to have 50% graduation rate, most colleges woul’nt be ranked.
Unranked colleges are often directional or local colleges that are accredited but aren’t especially distinguished in anything. They may have a history or serve local needs. They’re unranked because it’s difficult to distinguish between them.
A school’s “reputation” is part of the ranking formula, i.e. a bunch of university administrators voting who among them should be prom queen. People will vote for people they know.
It reaches a point that these people don’t have an opinion about an obscure school, just like u don’t have an opinion about every single kid in your school.
It comes to a point where you cannot collect enough data to rank schools by numbers as you get into so many schools that are similar. What the heck is the difference between number 1121 and 1122? It’s meaning less. I wish there were more categories even in the upper ranked schools. Most people will see the difference between HPYSM and the next “tier” but trying to figure who is #25 vs 26 gets ridiculous, as one can see from the changes in those positions each year.
I’ve long advocated the utilization of “grouping blocks” (of course, disagreements will still abound with this system). However, it could largely resolve the fundamental problem @cptofthehouse highlights. For example (and for illustration purposes ONLY):
Group A+/Most-selective National Research Universities: HYPSM . . .
Group A/Most-selective National Research Universities: Chicago, Columbia, Duke, Penn, CalTech . . .
Group A-/Most-selective National Research Universities: Tufts, Vanderbilt, Berkeley, JHU, Cornell . . .
Group B+/Highly-selective National Research Universities
. . . and so forth
Within each “grouping block,” the constituent schools would be alphabetically listed.
For a major that also requires accreditation in a professional field, is the college, university, or department accredited by that organization? Two good examples are engineering (http://www.abet.org/) and business (http://www.aacsb.edu/)
Is the college or university public or non-profit?
There are serious conflicts of interest for the heads of for-profit colleges and universities. Students are less likely to complete their educational programs and more likely to graduate with significant debt if they attend for-profit institutions. DeVry is a for-profit institution. That is almost certainly part of the reason why you have heard bad stuff about it.
@happymomof1 (re #15): Yes, indeed. It is my opinion that most/all for-profit “colleges and universities” are – in fact – usually only trade schools. When one receives a Bachelor’s Degree from “an ITT Tech,” does the curriculum include ANY of the traditional liberal arts courses that are required of (for example) engineering majors at “a Northwestern, Cornell, Duke, Berkeley, Ohio State, Virginia Tech, or Iowa State?” If not, the individual may be TRAINED, but he is hardly EDUCATED . . . and there is a critically significant difference.
Because its a business and understands its potential customers. Even 1000 colleges is probably way more than they need. Parents planning on sending their kid to Mediocre State don’t need a $10 publication to tell them where it sits in a ranking; that’s what they can afford, that’s where junior is going to go, period.
@TopTier, I don’t disagree with your points about for profit schools (for the most part anathema). But I think there are probably some non-profit Us which also don’t have distribution requirements. While I am a firm believer in a core curriculum there are some schools that are the complete opposite.