Top universities are “top” essentially because of professional schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

You're mistaken. Quite a few "elite" American universities don't have top tier business or law schools - Princeton, CalTech, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Brown, West Point, Annapolis, Williams, Amherst, Carnegie Mellon to name a few.

I'll grant you UVA though. Excellent law and business school.

And some are really well known in one graduate field and not the other. Or don't do it. Like Dartmouth and business. But no law school.

Annapolis and West Point should be on a totally different list.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

Say what? Michigan and UVA undergrad are neck-and-neck at 21 and 24. Wisconsin is far below at 39. When you look at the rankings of our nation's top publics, again, you have Michigan and UVA neck-and-neck at 3 and 4 and Wisconsin way down the list. That's evaluated for undergrad performance. https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/top-public

“Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin.”


History

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #2
Wisconsin #11
UVA #18….down there with Duke


Economics

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #12
Wisconsin #14
UVA #30….tied with UNC.

In discipline after discipline, both at the undergraduate and graduate levels, I see Michigan and Wisconsin ranked higher than UVA. Sure there are a few outliers, but

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

In economics, at my two schools, the same professors taught masters and undergrad courses (and were PhD dissertation advisors, of course). The undergrad had a business school, the econ profs were in the Arts and Science school but Business students could take econ as a major. At the PhD school, there was not a business school. But either way - the level of the post-grad program absolutely meant the undergrads were benefitting.

Absolutely true. It’s only proponents of schools without top graduate programs who make that claim.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

You're mistaken. Quite a few "elite" American universities don't have top tier business or law schools - Princeton, CalTech, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Brown, West Point, Annapolis, Williams, Amherst, Carnegie Mellon to name a few.

I'll grant you UVA though. Excellent law and business school.

And some are really well known in one graduate field and not the other. Or don't do it. Like Dartmouth and business. But no law school.

Duke currently has the #4 Law School and #12 business school according to U.S. News.

No one in law actually considers Duke a top 4 law school. harvard, yale, stanford, penn, chicago, northwestern, michigan, NYU, boalt, all out class it. This shows in the entering class stats as well.

People "in law" don't have intelligent opinions that are formed independent of US News. For as long as US News has been around, HLS has always had the absolute #1 Peer ratings (sometimes tied with Yale). But when US News changed the formula to heavily factor expenditure per student, they ensured that all smaller law schools would go up in rankings and HLS would go down. In the 1960s Yale made the curriculum kinder and gentler and thus started taking away many students who previously would have chosen Harvard. All of Yale's faculty stars are now at retirement age, and HLS is on the upswing again in terms of superb faculty quality, not to mention HLS' exceptional depth and breadth, and a general increase in quality of life (no grades). but it makes no difference until the USNEWS gods decide to change their bizarre quantitative weighting of various factors, which they will never do.

Duke is always regarded as a top law school by everyone. But a smart group of people might figure out that USNEWS is complete pile of crap. and should probably be ignored. This is DCUM, so unfortunately, this crowd will never figure it out.

But Harvard does have "grades" - it simply swapped out A,B,C D, fail for "dean's scholar, honirs, pass, low pass and fail"

Honors = A & A- (Dean's scholar is similar to A+ you could say); Pass = everything else (B+ and below). Almost no one gets a lowpass or fail. There is a similar system at Yale. Unfortunately, it appears that the adoption of the new grading system at HLS has done absolutely nothing to reduce the neuroticism of the student body. Also, it seems that levels of brown-nosing and backstabbing have reached new heights at Yale, though I'm not sure why.

[Anonymous]

According to Reuters, these are the 15 law schools that were a cut above the rest when it came to their 2023 first-time bar exam pass rates:

Michigan: 97.27%
Chicago: 97.10%
Vanderbilt: 96.97%
Yale: 96.79%
Stanford: 96.70%
NYU: 96.58%
UVA: 96.50%
Penn: 96.25%
Harvard: 96.10%
BC: 95.88%
BYU: 95.41%
Duke: 94.44%
Cornell: 94.29%
Texas: 94.01%
Utah: 93.98%

[Anonymous]

Duke is #1 in the US News ranking for Literary Criticism and Theory and has always been #1 and Johns Hopkins is really high up also. Duke is also extremely well regarded for undergraduate subjects such as public policy and biomedical engineering (and I believe Johns Hopkins is also highly regarded for biomedical engineering).

I think these universities have a lot of strengths in areas that have nothing to do with their professional schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Duke is #1 in the US News ranking for Literary Criticism and Theory and has always been #1 and Johns Hopkins is really high up also. Duke is also extremely well regarded for undergraduate subjects such as public policy and biomedical engineering (and I believe Johns Hopkins is also highly regarded for biomedical engineering).

I think these universities have a lot of strengths in areas that have nothing to do with their professional schools.

Yet #23 for undergraduate engineering. Meh.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

Say what? Michigan and UVA undergrad are neck-and-neck at 21 and 24. Wisconsin is far below at 39. When you look at the rankings of our nation's top publics, again, you have Michigan and UVA neck-and-neck at 3 and 4 and Wisconsin way down the list. That's evaluated for undergrad performance. https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/top-public

The students are without a doubt comparable, given that most talented Wisconsin students will chose UW Madison over most universities except for Harvard. That’s because of its remarkable faculty strength across disciplines. Furthermore, it does have a alumni network to Michigan and UVA. Just ask anymore who attended from the 70s or 80s, it had a really elite reputation.

[Anonymous]

“Duke is #1 in the US News ranking for Literary Criticism and Theory and has always been #1.”

Someone finaliy found a department where Duke is #1. lol

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

You're mistaken. Quite a few "elite" American universities don't have top tier business or law schools - Princeton, CalTech, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Brown, West Point, Annapolis, Williams, Amherst, Carnegie Mellon to name a few.

I'll grant you UVA though. Excellent law and business school.

And some are really well known in one graduate field and not the other. Or don't do it. Like Dartmouth and business. But no law school.

Duke currently has the #4 Law School and #12 business school according to U.S. News.

Since most of the top law schools refuse to submit data anymore to USNWR, I’d take that current ranking with a grain of salt.

I wish the top undergraduate schools would refuse to submit data as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

Say what? Michigan and UVA undergrad are neck-and-neck at 21 and 24. Wisconsin is far below at 39. When you look at the rankings of our nation's top publics, again, you have Michigan and UVA neck-and-neck at 3 and 4 and Wisconsin way down the list. That's evaluated for undergrad performance. https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/top-public

“Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin.”


History

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #2
Wisconsin #11
UVA #18….down there with Duke


Economics

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #12
Wisconsin #14
UVA #30….tied with UNC.

In discipline after discipline, both at the undergraduate and graduate levels, I see Michigan and Wisconsin ranked higher than UVA. Sure there are a few outliers, but

I'd like to see the Michigan and Wisconsin graduates in these disciplines sit for knowledge tests vs say Swarthmore. I wonder if the superior department rankings of Michigan and Wisconsin would produce better educated graduates than Swarthmore. I actually think I know the answer to that one. . .

[Anonymous]

Halo effect.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

Say what? Michigan and UVA undergrad are neck-and-neck at 21 and 24. Wisconsin is far below at 39. When you look at the rankings of our nation's top publics, again, you have Michigan and UVA neck-and-neck at 3 and 4 and Wisconsin way down the list. That's evaluated for undergrad performance. https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/top-public

“Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin.”


History

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #2
Wisconsin #11
UVA #18….down there with Duke


Economics

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #12
Wisconsin #14
UVA #30….tied with UNC.

In discipline after discipline, both at the undergraduate and graduate levels, I see Michigan and Wisconsin ranked higher than UVA. Sure there are a few outliers, but

I'd like to see the Michigan and Wisconsin graduates in these disciplines sit for knowledge tests vs say Swarthmore. I wonder if the superior department rankings of Michigan and Wisconsin would produce better educated graduates than Swarthmore. I actually think I know the answer to that one. . .

Michigan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I’ve noticed this thing with college rankings and it appears that the universities we consider to be “top” are top because of specifically business and law school rankings ( medical school is a different). With the exception of a handful of privates like Johns Hopkins or Rice, along with the ivies of Princeton and Brown, most universities derive their reputations primarily from just these two subjects. Take UVA for example. Historically, it is not well known in either stem or humanities quite frankly. Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin. But, UVA is seen as comparable and even better than those two, based purely on business and law schools. Furthermore, undergraduate selectivity seems to be primarily generated through competitive pre law/pre-mba finance bros.

Say what? Michigan and UVA undergrad are neck-and-neck at 21 and 24. Wisconsin is far below at 39. When you look at the rankings of our nation's top publics, again, you have Michigan and UVA neck-and-neck at 3 and 4 and Wisconsin way down the list. That's evaluated for undergrad performance. https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/top-public

“Just compare their department rankings in economics or history to the more historically prestigious Michigan and Wisconsin.”


History

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #2
Wisconsin #11
UVA #18….down there with Duke


Economics

https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-humanities-schools/history-rankings

Michigan #12
Wisconsin #14
UVA #30….tied with UNC.

In discipline after discipline, both at the undergraduate and graduate levels, I see Michigan and Wisconsin ranked higher than UVA. Sure there are a few outliers, but

I'd like to see the Michigan and Wisconsin graduates in these disciplines sit for knowledge tests vs say Swarthmore. I wonder if the superior department rankings of Michigan and Wisconsin would produce better educated graduates than Swarthmore. I actually think I know the answer to that one. . .

Michigan.

Most insufferable was not the question.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:“Duke is #1 in the US News ranking for Literary Criticism and Theory and has always been #1.”

Someone finaliy found a department where Duke is #1. lol

who is number 1 for gender studies though? is that duke too?