Scathing Summary of Northeastern Admissions

[Anonymous]

QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

except that nobody cares about it even those international students, but suit yourself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just so odd that because some boomer parent had their kid rejected from Northeastern that it burns their soul so much they go on this quest to inform the world that Northeastern is the evil empire?

Northeastern is the poster child of how to survive as an academic institution in this day and age. Unfortunately for the OP they are thriving.

Nobody from an educated background is letting their kids apply to NEU. Full stop.

What’s wrong with you people?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is with this thread? Why is there so much hate for what is a fairly decent school? Northeastern isn't Harvard nor is it trying to be. It's trying to be successful in the current market. Plenty of students are choosing it and I don't understand why that offends people

Deep insecurity? Mental illness?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

except that nobody cares about it even those international students, but suit yourself.

Actually it is the gold standard across the world, including the educated within the USA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

All rankings are arbitrary.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

except that nobody cares about it even those international students, but suit yourself.

Actually it is the gold standard across the world, including the educated within the USA.

Congrats your school is ranked high on that ranking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

except that nobody cares about it even those international students, but suit yourself.

Actually it is the gold standard across the world, including the educated within the USA.

No, the "THE" ranking has always been more respected globally than "QS".

That said, it weights research output quite heavily, more so than other outputs such as class size, graduation in 4 years, admission rate, student experience, strength of individual departments. So it favors a huge school like University of Toronto (which is known in Canada as "University of Tears" because of the poor student experience/weeding out) which has 50,000 undergrads in the downtown campus and classes of over 500 students.

It's a good ranking for some criteria and graduate research output, but not meaningful for most undergraduate teens making a college choice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think anyone would argue NEU belongs among the T125-T200 schools.

However, fixating on the ranking and admissions stats is a red flag and suggests that there is a disconnect between what the school actually offers students and their numbers.

Look for where the alumni of any school have landed in life. If the alumni placement and network is strong, that means more than statistics derived by marketing departments.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that Northeastern counts the total applicant count in the denominator but not the numerator, which is, at best, misleading and realistically, an outward lie.

All of the full-pay admits to their portfolio of campuses around the world are not calculated in their admission rate. In fact, they are misleadingly considered rejected in the calculation (and the GPA, test scores of the non-Boston admits aren't incorporated either).

Ugh how misleading. And it's included in all the rankings too. Then because it appears to be more selective than it is, gullible teens apply thinking it's a proxy for quality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that Northeastern counts the total applicant count in the denominator but not the numerator, which is, at best, misleading and realistically, an outward lie.

All of the full-pay admits to their portfolio of campuses around the world are not calculated in their admission rate. In fact, they are misleadingly considered rejected in the calculation (and the GPA, test scores of the non-Boston admits aren't incorporated either).

Ugh how misleading. And it's included in all the rankings too. Then because it appears to be more selective than it is, gullible teens apply thinking it's a proxy for quality.

Acceptance rate is not even counted toward ranking at least for the gold standard ranking for undergrad, USN&WR.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that Northeastern counts the total applicant count in the denominator but not the numerator, which is, at best, misleading and realistically, an outward lie.

All of the full-pay admits to their portfolio of campuses around the world are not calculated in their admission rate. In fact, they are misleadingly considered rejected in the calculation (and the GPA, test scores of the non-Boston admits aren't incorporated either).

Ugh how misleading. And it's included in all the rankings too. Then because it appears to be more selective than it is, gullible teens apply thinking it's a proxy for quality.

Exactly, at a time where students are equating a low admissions rate with quality and prestige and shelling out nearly 100k per year it is fraudulent. . .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

except that nobody cares about it even those international students, but suit yourself.

Actually it is the gold standard across the world, including the educated within the USA.

No, the "THE" ranking has always been more respected globally than "QS".

That said, it weights research output quite heavily, more so than other outputs such as class size, graduation in 4 years, admission rate, student experience, strength of individual departments. So it favors a huge school like University of Toronto (which is known in Canada as "University of Tears" because of the poor student experience/weeding out) which has 50,000 undergrads in the downtown campus and classes of over 500 students.

It's a good ranking for some criteria and graduate research output, but not meaningful for most undergraduate teens making a college choice.

Industry standard graduation rate is based on 6 years considering some programs are based on 5 years, students changing majors, double majors, transfer, certain majors like engineering often takes more than 4 years, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

except that nobody cares about it even those international students, but suit yourself.

Actually it is the gold standard across the world, including the educated within the USA.

No, the "THE" ranking has always been more respected globally than "QS".

That said, it weights research output quite heavily, more so than other outputs such as class size, graduation in 4 years, admission rate, student experience, strength of individual departments. So it favors a huge school like University of Toronto (which is known in Canada as "University of Tears" because of the poor student experience/weeding out) which has 50,000 undergrads in the downtown campus and classes of over 500 students.

It's a good ranking for some criteria and graduate research output, but not meaningful for most undergraduate teens making a college choice.

That doesn't sound right regarding "THE". Regardless:

Times Higher Education 2026 World Rankings
#2 MIT
#5 Harvard
#76 Boston University
#189 Tufts
#201-250 Northeastern

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Take it with an obvious grain of salt as this was an Instagram post from a college advisor and quasi-influencer, but I happen to agree with the substance:

Northeastern isn’t a bad school. They just LIE, a lot.

That 5% acceptance rate is completely manufactured. They only count students admitted to the Boston campus. Meanwhile thousands more get accepted into NUin, Global Scholars, London, Oakland, and now NYC. For the class of 2028 alone, only about 2,700 students were admitted to Boston, but over 3,300 more got in through those other programs that conveniently don’t show up in the number. If you count everyone they actually accept, the real rate is way higher than 5%. And be honest, who’s dreaming of spending their freshman year at Northeastern’s Oakland campus? Nobody applied to Northeastern for that.

They’ve rigged the front end too. No supplemental essays. Test optional. Applying to Northeastern is basically a one-click process through the Common App, which is exactly the point. The more unqualified applicants they attract, the lower that rate looks on paper.

Total cost of attendance at Northeastern runs around $90–94K a year. Harvard is about $87K with WAY more aid at Harvard. You’re paying more than Harvard for a degree that no one is that impressed by.

Now I already know the Northeastern crowd is gonna flood my comments bragging about their co-ops. A co-op is an internship. That’s it. The rest of us can apply for internships on our own, graduate on time, and we don’t have to pay $94,000 a year for the privilege.

Now is Northeastern worth going to sometimes? Yes. Of course. If it’s your LOWEST cost option. At least then you’re getting value for your money🤷‍♂️

This paragraph both complains about the "artificial" acceptance rate for the school because it's just for the Boston campus AND complains that no one wants to go anywhere but to the Boston campus - so to me that acceptance rate is exactly the information that this quasi-influencer says applicants should need. If "nobody" wants to go to any of the other programs NEU is doing applicants a favor by not including that data in their acceptance rate.

My family has no interest in NEU, but they also are no where near the only school who plays these games and charges these dollars.

The notion that NEU is doing this for transparency and altruistic reasons is obviously disingenuous. They are doing it to artificially manipulate rankings while concurrently maximizing revenue from their conscientious strategy of adding capacity outside of Boston for lower-stats, full-pay kids that think they're getting into an incredibly competitive institution. I have no issue with the philosophy of the school - I think the co-op program is great. I am, however, repulsed by the blatantly misleading manipulation of the rankings that should be smarter and more nuanced but are not.

agreed