<p>In 110 years of awarding Rhodes Scholarships (1903-2013), the Rhodes Trust has awarded Tufts students the scholarship only 4 times. </p>
<p>By contrast, 8 Wellesley students have won the award, despite the fact that women have only been able to compete for it since the late 1970s.</p>
<p>Schools which Tufts considers its peers significantly outperform it. Why is this?</p>
<p>Dartmouth - 61
Brown - 51
Williams - 32
Swarthmore - 28
Georgetown - 23
Amherst - 20
Penn -19
JHU -18 </p>
<p>Based on a previous thread Tufts students are going to the Peace Corps instead. Rhodes Scholarship is one of many prizes and programs for graduates. Not sure that there is anything to read in to why there are more applicants and/or winners from one school or another, or any way to realistically determine the reasons.</p>
<p>Tufts also significantly underperforms its peers in wining both Marshall and Fulbright scholarships. That Tufts graduates go into the Peace Corps in decent number is interesting, but not directly relevant to this issue.</p>
<p>Is it that Tufts prepares its students to compete for these awards and they consistently lose?</p>
<p>Is it that Tufts does not prepare its students to compete and they lose?</p>
<p>Is it that Tufts students have no interest in these awards and/or they see themselves as unqualified and don’t apply?</p>
<p>One of the Tufts admission officers on this site should be able to answer these questions. They are pretty straightforward. </p>
<p>GreeIndian –</p>
<p>You pose an interesting question, but … </p>
<p>Your statement about Fulbright scholarships is not supported by data, and according to this source, Tufts is actually regarded as being a top producer (along with Harvard). </p>
<p><a href=“Tufts A Top Producer Of Fulbright Scholars | HuffPost College”>HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost;
<p>The Rhodes Scholar website actually warns against using their data in the way that you are attempting:</p>
<p>“ We hesitate to publish this due to the ease in which these statistics are misused and misinterpreted, but we do so as lists like this are now widely available but frequently inaccurate."</p>
<p>"Please keep in mind though that the Rhodes Scholarship competition has never been a national one, so state and institutional comparisons are not particularly relevant or meaningful.”</p>
<p>In summary, the data from prehistoric times (i.e. before my graduation in 1981) is largely irrelevant and one needs to be aware of the fact that the scholarships are allocated on a state by state basis (with Washington DC treated as a separate entity). This makes winning an award in a state like Massachusetts (where there are 12 separate colleges that have graduated Rhodes Scholars) more difficult than states like New Hampshire, Rhode Island, DC or Maryland (where there is essentially only one).</p>
<p><a href=“Office of the American Secretary | The Rhodes Scholarships”>http://www.rhodesscholar.org/winners/college-and-university-winners</a></p>
<p>If we look at the data on American Rhodes Scholars from modern times (i.e. after my graduation in 1981) and note the states where each school resides, then the differences become much less compelling, and some new questions arise.</p>
<p>Tufts (MA)-3
Amherst (MA) -5
Wellesley (MA) -6
Williams (MA) -9
Swarthmore ¶-6
UPenn ¶ -7
JHU (MD) - 6
Dartmouth (NH) -11
Brown (RI) -19
Georgetown (DC) – 21</p>
<p>If we compare the two tables, we see that as we moved from prehistoric to modern times, the output of some schools has decreased, while the output of others has increased.</p>
<p>The school exhibiting the most dramatic decline is Dartmouth, while the school exhibiting the most dramatic increase is Georgetown.</p>
<p>As a matter of curiosity, the inflection point for Dartmouth seems to occur in late seventies shortly after they discontinued the use of the Green Indian as their symbol (early to mid 70’s) and right around the time of the release of the movie Animal House (1978). In the three and a half decades leading up to this point they produced about 28 scholars while in the three and a half decades following this point, they produced about 13.</p>
<p>Mastodon - Tufts is not consistently a top producer of Fulbright Scholars. It had one year in which it tied Harvard, and another year in which it did OK. You cannot cherry-pick data like this to make your case. Please go back into each year’s files on Fulbright awards and you will see that Tufts consistently underperforms peer schools - LACs and universities.</p>
<p>Your understanding of the Rhodes selection process is simply wrong and thus your analysis is completely faulty. Again you cherry-pick a quote from the Rhodes Trust, and use it in support of a faulty argument. Your are attempting to baffle though BS. </p>
<p>On Dartmouth, whose mascot once was a Green Indian (unrelated to me - I am from India, not too long off the boat, as it were), your data suggests that Dartmouth produced Rhodes Scholars at more than four times the rate of Tufts. Pretty significantly better.</p>
<p>I would like one of the Tufts admissions officer to enlighten us all here. You have the information, and should have a perspective on this matter. Inquiring minds want to know. Prospective parents and students deserve your perspective.</p>
<p>The Tufts admission team is very approachable. Go the their blog and ask away.</p>
<p>No need to go to our blogs, as it turns out. </p>
<p>I have no opinion on this topic. Honestly, I don’t know anything about how the Rhodes Scholars get selected, nor have I known anyone in my time at Tufts who was aspiring to become one. My guess, and this is total speculation, is that there are some schools, on an institutional level, are more excited about Rhodes Scholarships than others, and that is what drives disparities. </p>
<p>But I really have no idea. I know you feel that I should have a perspective on the matter, but I don’t. Sorry to disappoint; it sounds, GreenIndian, like you know more about this than I do. </p>
<p>Green Indian</p>
<p>To clarify:</p>
<p>I still think that you posed an interesting question, but I also think that your method of engagement seems overly combative and is counterproductive to arriving at a potential answer. </p>
<p>Up to this point, I have not proposed an answer to your question, because I don’t believe the answer is straightforward – that is what makes it interesting. </p>
<p>What I have done is bring forth data that is inconsistent with the inferences you are making from your data. </p>
<p>With respect to Fulbright scholarships, you made a statement: </p>
<p>“Please go back into each year’s files on Fulbright awards and you will see that Tufts consistently underperforms peer schools - LACs and universities.”</p>
<p>Below is a table based on the ten years of data (from 2004-2005 to 2013-2014) taken from the Fulbright website. It includes the total number of Fulbright awards for the schools defined as Tufts’ “peers” in your original post. </p>
<p>Brown 210
JHU 137
UPenn 129-136
GTown 108
Tufts 100
Swarthmore 85
Wellesley 69-76
Dartmouth 69-76
Williams 65-66
Amherst 57 </p>
<p>In an interesting twist, the 10-year dataset places Tufts’ output of Fulbright Scholars near the middle of the peer group that you chose, right at the borderline between the LACs and the universities, while Dartmouth appears near the middle of the LACs. It is important to note that over a period of ten years, no college performed “consistently”, so one’s perception of relative “ performance” is dependent on which subset of the data one is looking at . </p>
<p>The Tufts problem with the Rhodes is shared by almost all non-Ivy schools. The plain fact is that the Rhodes was given out mostly to Ivy students over the past decades and these students now populate the Rhodes selection committees in each State. Naturally, they have a bias towards their own and perpetuating the numbers of the Harvards and Yales in the top ranks. It is a self-reinforcing cycle. There will every year be a few surprises, but more on the reverse of March Madness – that is, a choice from a State school (like U Montana, which has more than its share of Rhodes) will “upset” the natural Ivy dominance. Rhodes is an Ivy institution, pure and simple, and it is unlikely to give out these prizes to others who might tout the acceptances and end up competing in a few decades with the Ivies. I feel for Tufts and the others in this situation, but the Rhodes is a tainted, tilted playing field – perhaps permanently so.</p>
<p>Green Indian-</p>
<p>To Clarify:</p>
<p>With respect to the Rhodes quote and Rhodes process:</p>
<p>I included the link that contained the quote in my post to provide both context and additional detail about the process and how it has changed over time. </p>
<p>Just in case there is problem with the link, here is the entire webpage:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>So the process that you may be familiar with now (having just recently arrived in america) has actually only been in place for a few years, whereas the data you provided (and correctly noted in your original post) spans 110 years.</p>