U.S. News & World Report: 40
THE/WSJ: 84
Forbes: 106
ARWU: 117–137
Washington Monthly: 343
I’ve always been under the impression that Tulane is an elite institution, but these rankings seem to indicate otherwise. I’m a rising junior in HS if that matters. The admittance statistics show that admission is extremely competitive with highly laureled admittees, so why the low rankings?
That’s low according to who? There are 4000+ colleges in the country. None of those numbers seem that bad in comparison.
Lack of prestige. Tulane seems super competitive to students, and it certainly is selective, but I think that 11% admissions rate is a clever trick. They have a free application, driving many southern students to apply for the hell of it. It has the admissions rate of a T25, but lacks the prestige among academics.
It is a good school, and you should apply. It is certainly a unique place. It is also elite- the numbers are still quite high- just not as elite as that 11% would make you think.
Admission selectivity and laureled admittees is only a small portion of the weightings in any of the above rankings. For example, the Washington Monthly with the 343 ranking uses the following weightings. Note that admission selectivity is not considered, and they are likely focusing on different types of laurels than you are (earnings, % who get PhD, % who join service organizations, etc).
1/3 – Social Mobility (graduation rate, Pell grant, affordability, earnings after college…)
1/3 – Research (research spending, % of students get PhD, faulty awards/honors…)
1/3 – Community and National Service (military service, peace corps, voting rate, …)
Tulane ranked
Social Mobility – 375 (pulled down by 58% graduation rate)
Research – 107
Community Service – 186
Combined – 343
I’m not sure where they get the 58% 8-year graduation rate from, which seems to be pulling down the ranking? Tulane’s actual graduation rate is quite a bit higher. Perhaps it’s a typo or involves some computation based on special groups or expected vs actual.
In any case, I’d suggest focusing on the criteria that is important to you, not an arbitrary ranking on some website. If you like Tulane, apply.
Sometimes I get upset that one of my favorite schools isn’t ranked higher–until I see the schools ranked ahead of it.
That 58% graduation rate must be from the late 2000’s after Katrina and a significant part of the student body transferred out.
Tulane is a great school but it is not elite and it has a very modest endowment.
Tulane’s retention rate has been above 90% for at least the past 7 years.
The 8-year federal graduation rates as listed on IPEDS are below. It’s quite a bit above 58% in every available year. The Pell grant graduation rates range from 73% to 79%, so that also would not explain it. Even the 4-year graduation rates are well above 58%. It’s also interesting that the 58% graduation rate in the 2019 Washington Monthly rankings decreased substantially from rate listed in the previous year’s Washington Monthly ranking.
2018 – 83%
2017 – 84%
2016 – 83%
2015 – 77%
2014 – 76%
Other colleges I checked seem to have graduation rates that are reasonably close to expectations, and sometimes those graduation rates are quite high. For example Harvard and Princeton show a 98% grad rate. Duke shows 97%.
At $1.43 billion, Tulane’s endowment isn’t modest by any means. It is also considered to be “elite” by Barron’s definitions.
Tulane’s endowment is roughly ranked #76. I’d agree with TomSr, that sounds modest to me. But we’re talking about semantics.
And we all have different definitions of “elite.”
Which is one of the multitude of reasons that I don’t like the term “elite”.
Is Tulane really not elite? I thought many Tulane students were accepted to T25 schools yet chose Tulane for its balance of academic excellence and fun. It’s hard to imagine that so many qualified applicants would forgo T25 schools for a non-elite option.
They may if they get a lot of merit aid from Tulane. Very few T25 schools offer merit aid.
For context, consider the admission stats for Tulane’s most recent freshman class: SAT composite middle 50 percentiles, 1370-1480. Average high school GPA, 3.56.
https://tulane.app.box.com/s/zdns25egfljq26bpvb2kf4f1g21bpvn0
What does the context show? That my belief that many Tulane students were accepted to T25 schools yet chose Tulane is false?
Their ACT mid 50% is 31-33, and 71% submitted ACT scores…
The disconnect between having mid 50% ACT and SAT scores in the 93rd-99th percentiles while having an average GPA of B+/A- is interesting. It is also interesting that they have 3.56 average GPA after selecting only 11% of the applicants.
I mean, UIUC had the same number of applicants, accepted 56% of them, and UIUC’s class of 2024 had a higher average GPA than Tulane’s class of 2024. There is no way that UIUC’s pool of applicants was better than Tulane’s, and even if it was, Tulane only selected 1/5 of the number of applicants that UIUC did. Even if we remove UIUC’s College of Engineering, we will get a higher average GPA.
“Tulane is an elite institution”
Really? I don’t think that is a commonly held view at all.
It depends on what you mean by “many.” Some, of course. Tulane’s class of 2023 average high school GPA of 3.56 is not on par with typical T20 selectivity. T20 average high school GPAs for enrolled students tend to be north of 3.8, typically 3.9+, though not all of them publish that field in the Common Data Set anymore. Tulane’s test score ranges are also lower than the ranges published by T20s. Accordingly, most (over half of) enrolled students at Tulane would not have had stats likely to lead to T20 acceptances, although naturally there is some overlap at Tulane’s higher end.
(A guess which might be useful to some applicants, Tulane seems willing to accept a relatively modest GPA in exchange for relatively higher test scores.)
By who? CC is only a small slice of society, and a highly biased one, at that. We’re talking about people who think that a college applicant with stats that are in the top 20% is only “average”. For the vast majority of people, including you and me, “commonly held view” = “commonly held view among the people I hang out with”.
Barron’s considers them to be “elite”, and so do many people outside of CC.
What determines whether a college is “elite”?
By who? CC is only a small slice of society, and a highly biased one<<<<<<<<<
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I actually though it was ONLY on CC that this was considered a top school. But you added Barron’s LOL, so there you have it.