Sept. 6 WSJ Rankings

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DS is a HS senior and I have yet to hear any parent or kid tout W&M. I'm disappointed. Fortunately, VT is a target and UVA worth a $70 shot. But what is happening with W&M?

I think the poor food and 10 year construction plan are not helping. They have to do update so the construction is a must, but it definitely pushed my kid away. It wasn’t a great, exciting, collegiate vibe and we went on an open house weekend so it should have been big and exciting (like at Villanova and Tech). Plus all the kids talk about how awful the food is.

Not a booster but they did sign with a new dining provider and I do believe some new dorms (the representative dorm they had on the 2021 tour was repulsive) are under construction. There should be some info re: those plans on their Reddit or school newspaper site, “The Flat Hat.”

[Anonymous]

I don't have access to the WSJ, but from what I read here, the ranking is focused on financial return on investment (not sure if it is $-terms or % from calculating $-return/$-cost).

That's not irrelevant and a useful exercise. For many households $300,000-$400,000 x the number of DCren is not a trivial expense - believe it or not.

Is it all there's to college quality? No, of course not but this is also not the only ranking. I'm pretty sure if you take this and combine with reading a few others as well, you'll get a different overall picture of e.g., Babson vs Bowdoin.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The list is absurd. Florida International is ranked 29 while Williams is 31.

Lehigh is 14, NJIT is 19, BYU is 20. Garbage in garbage out.

Disagree.

Just suggests that you are unfamiliar with FIU, Lehigh, NJIT, & BYU job placement statistics.

Schools with engineering and business programs seem to do better here. Obviously an accounting major has better salary prospects than an anthropologist. This doesn’t make Babson (number 10) better than Bowdoin (89) in any reasonable sense.

It does if one's focus is ROI (return on investment).

Not really. Kids attend these schools with different motivations. It’s measuring apples and oranges.

Then let them research & create their own college rating & ranking system that would be useful to millions of readers.

USNWR for all its flaws is a lot more sensible when comparing schools. Statistical analysis detached from reason is potentially more harmful than helpful.

[Anonymous]

2024 WSJ
1. Princeton
2. MIT
3. Yale
4. Stanford
5. Columbia
6. Harvard
7. Penn
8. Amherst
9. CMC
10. Babson
11. Swarthmore
12. Gtown
13. Vanderbilt
14. Lehigh
15. Florida
16. Duke
17. Rose Hulman
18. CIT
19. NJIT
20. BYU
21. Dartmouth
22. USC
23. Illinois Tech
24. Cornell
25. Northwestern
26. WUStL
27. Lake Forest
28. Michigan
29. FIU
30. Davidson
31. Williams
32. Notre Dame
33. LaVerne
34. RPI
35. UIUC
36. Stevens
37. Chicago
38. Texas A&M
39. GA Tech
40. Colgate
41. Haverford
42. Emory
43. Utah
44. W&L
45. BC
46. UConn
47. Baruch
48. TJ Univ
49. Pomona
50. Colby

51. Cal
58. GW
74. UCLA
76. VA Tech
79. Wisconsin
83. UNC
84. UVA
95. Mason
99. Hopkins
115. Purdue
128. Towson
131. Middlebury
132. AU
138. NEU
140. UMD
152. JMU
154. Indiana
166. NYU
170. Georgia
193. Tennessee
200. BU
212. WM
218. Carleton
220. PSU
222. OSU
232. Elon
238. CWRU
243. ODU
246. CU Boulder
252. WVU
266. Grinnell
270. Alabama
274. S. Carolina
284. Vassar
287. Tufts
298. Kenyon
303. Miami OH
307. Pitt
315. Howard
317. Denison
318. VCU
326. CNU
354. Tulane

[Anonymous]

The 2024 WSJ College Rankings must be legitimate because the schools with the top 5 largest endowments are ranked 1, 2, 3, 4, & 6.

I only gained access to the Top 20:

1) Princeton
2) MIT
3) Yale
4) Stanford
5) Columbia

6) Harvard
7) U Penn
8) Amherst College
9) Claremont McKenna College
10) Babson College

11) Swarthmore college
12) Georgetown
13) Vanderbilt
14) Lehigh
15) Univ. of Florida

16) Duke
17) Rose Hulman Inst. of Tech.
18) California Inst. of Tech.
19) NJIT
20) BYU

The Top 20 look reasonable to me for a list of schools ranked by ROI.

[Anonymous]

Ok, this ranking is absolutely crazy and methodology is absolutely specious, so much so that I am surprised it got by the WSJ editors. The 70% “outcomes” weighting is largely driven by the calculated “value-added” by the college. They do this by totally ignoring the input of a high-achieving, top quality student and instead try to determine what “should” that student be making if he had gone to another “comparable” institution, say Penn instead of Brown, vs what that student is actually making. So, it has the effect of magnifying in geometric terms the 1st year salary differentials between schools in different selectivity tiers and rather bizarrely does not account for mix differentials such as engineering majors vs. engineering majors and classics majors vs. classics majors. The entire methodology fails data science 101. Our country is screwed if this passes for analysis/insight. I am absolutely for outcomes based rankings but to ignore absolute outcomes in favor of an incredibly flawed attempt to determine value-added by the college vs. some “expected value” for the student had he gone somewhere else is insane. In statistical terms, the error term is sky high here.

[Anonymous]

I don't think DCUM takes regional bias into consideration. UMD is a good school, as we know, but it's a good school with a regional reputation. It's not well known outside this area. And so .. when some publication ranks FL schools highly, people go nuts. But it may be we just don't know enough.

Also, this list is trash. ALL lists are trash.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok, this ranking is absolutely crazy and methodology is absolutely specious, so much so that I am surprised it got by the WSJ editors. The 70% “outcomes” weighting is largely driven by the calculated “value-added” by the college. They do this by totally ignoring the input of a high-achieving, top quality student and instead try to determine what “should” that student be making if he had gone to another “comparable” institution, say Penn instead of Brown, vs what that student is actually making. So, it has the effect of magnifying in geometric terms the 1st year salary differentials between schools in different selectivity tiers and rather bizarrely does not account for mix differentials such as engineering majors vs. engineering majors and classics majors vs. classics majors. The entire methodology fails data science 101. Our country is screwed if this passes for analysis/insight. I am absolutely for outcomes based rankings but to ignore absolute outcomes in favor of an incredibly flawed attempt to determine value-added by the college vs. some “expected value” for the student had he gone somewhere else is insane. In statistical terms, the error term is sky high here.

In short, your school did not receive a high ranking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The list is absurd. Florida International is ranked 29 while Williams is 31.

Lehigh is 14, NJIT is 19, BYU is 20. Garbage in garbage out.

Disagree.

Just suggests that you are unfamiliar with FIU, Lehigh, NJIT, & BYU job placement statistics.

Schools with engineering and business programs seem to do better here. Obviously an accounting major has better salary prospects than an anthropologist. This doesn’t make Babson (number 10) better than Bowdoin (89) in any reasonable sense.

It does if one's focus is ROI (return on investment).

Not really. Kids attend these schools with different motivations. It’s measuring apples and oranges.

Then let them research & create their own college rating & ranking system that would be useful to millions of readers.

+1 for most people, the ROI is the most important factor because most people don't have $60k+/ year to shell out for four years just so their Larlo/a can go find themselves in college.

[Anonymous]

What is Brown ranked?

[Anonymous]

Caltech? Berkeley?

[Anonymous]

“I don’t know why you’re so sad about the Chicago & Hopkins rejections, honey…you got into LaVerne!”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok, this ranking is absolutely crazy and methodology is absolutely specious, so much so that I am surprised it got by the WSJ editors. The 70% “outcomes” weighting is largely driven by the calculated “value-added” by the college. They do this by totally ignoring the input of a high-achieving, top quality student and instead try to determine what “should” that student be making if he had gone to another “comparable” institution, say Penn instead of Brown, vs what that student is actually making. So, it has the effect of magnifying in geometric terms the 1st year salary differentials between schools in different selectivity tiers and rather bizarrely does not account for mix differentials such as engineering majors vs. engineering majors and classics majors vs. classics majors. The entire methodology fails data science 101. Our country is screwed if this passes for analysis/insight. I am absolutely for outcomes based rankings but to ignore absolute outcomes in favor of an incredibly flawed attempt to determine value-added by the college vs. some “expected value” for the student had he gone somewhere else is insane. In statistical terms, the error term is sky high here.

In short, your school did not receive a high ranking.

PP, actually I went to Columbia. I just hate sloppy work, and I will call it out when I see it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Caltech? Berkeley?

18, 51

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is Brown ranked?

67