40 Colleges & Universities Receive 5 Star Academic Rating

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

Agreed. Berkeley blows away UVA in academic departments.

The book lists Berkeley's top programs as: Biological Science, Business, Chemistry, Computer Science, Economics, Engineering, English, and Psychology.

That’s a very small sampling of Cal’s strengths. Berkeley has top programs in almost all of its offerings. Way, way more than UVA. It isn’t even close. That is only gets a 4.5 star rating from this ranking is a joke.

Probably the impacted major thing plus the high % TAs teaching undergrads vs. profs

That and class sizes.

But I would think all this would apply to each of the big public universities. I personally don’t see UVA and UCLA offering a better academic experience than Berkeley. They are fantastic values, but that’s really a different thing. I would have all three at 4.5. And drop some of the other 4.5s to 4.0.

It’s worth remembering the authors of college guides want to sell books. And if all the top rated schools for actual academic experience are of small to medium undergrad size, they might have a reduced audience.

Maybe there should be different rankings for public universities vs private universities vs LACs. Similar to USNWR but with a category for national public unis. The trade offs and experiences are so different across the groups. Having different lists would force more reflection on what matters to a given student and family, rather than just automatically valuing the higher ranked thing when apples, oranges, and bananas are being compared.

+1

I started this thread. I agree with the above quoted post's suggestion that, among elite schools, Private National Universities should be viewed differently than Public National Universities for ranking purposes, and that LACs belong in a totally different category.

When all types of schools are combined, I think that the Wall Street Journal / Times Higher Education (WSJ/THE) rankings do a great job due to the focus on outcomes (heavier weighting for outcomes).

Also agree that families and students have different priorities for their undergraduate experience.

The problem with the THE/WSJ consolidated list is that their methodology was originally devised for comparing global universities where research is the priority. It’s really not well suited for LACs, which don’t exist in the UK (where THE is based.). This is why there are no LACs in their combined top 20 of US colleges. This should give pause when considering how LACs are entirely focused on undergrads, are half of the 20 best endowed colleges on a per student basis are LACs.

To be more specific, 30% of their weighting goes towards “Resources.” But that is weighted as 11% finance per student, 11% faculty per student, and 8% research papers per faculty. We know that papers per faculty is biased towards universities straight off. But the other 22% is also going to be misleading, because faculty and finances are not evenly split amongst grads and undergrads when both are present; there’s going to be far more money and faculty time spent on grad students than on undergrads on a per student basis. A compensating adjustment needs to be taking place but isn’t. (For me this was one of the key takeaways of the recent Columbia analysis of how their numbers were overstating undergrad investment… universities simply lack established conventions on how to do this; it’s less of an issue when comparing to other universities but distortions will be more pronounced when comparing to LACs where necessarily 100% of the funds and faculty focus go to educating the undergrad population).

I disagree as the methodology used by the WSJ/THE 2022 college rankings focuses on areas that are fair to both National Universities and to Liberal Arts Colleges.

The 4 weighted areas used: Outcomes 40%, Resources 30%, Engagement 20%, and Environment 10%

https://timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/wall-street-journal-times-higher-education-college-rankings-2022

In the case of an LAC, 100% of the resources (30%) go to the undergrads.

In the case of the university, we don’t really know how much of a budget or a professor’s office or research time goes to an undergrad vs the grad student, we only know they prioritize the latter but that the metrics used by WSJ don’t explain if or how they account for that difference.

You make very strong arguments in favor of SLACs with high endowments or high endowments per student (or am i reading too much into your well reasoned comments ?).

I agree that some will prefer a near 100% focus on undergraduate education in a more intimate setting rather than attending a much larger school with a significant presence of graduate students.

Among elite Private National Universities, some student populations are about 50% undergraduate and 50% graduate students (Northwestern University is an example where grad students may outnumber undergrads), but this provides more resources and engenders a serious academic environment.

It would be interesting to list the top 20 private National Universities by percentage of grad students & undergraduates.

You are not misreading, and I appreciate the kind words.

I don’t know of a listing that sorts NUs by undergrad percentage. However, my impression is that split was a factor many used when responding to the USNWR survey specifically asking for focus on undergrad teaching. You've probably seen it, but here's the link:

https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/undergraduate-teaching

I would agree NUs with a large percentage of undergrads offer an interesting compromise (as do LACs with traditions in encouraging undergrad research). Research opportunities can be very rewarding for the sufficiently motivated and undeterred. At the large universities, the trick it seems is not giving up after the first couple years of overpacked lecture halls and (comparatively) aloof profs.

[Anonymous]

Carnegie Mellon, Emory, Tufts, & NYU are composed of approximately 50% undergrads and 50% grad students.

Rice & Vanderbilt are close to 50/50 as well.

No great significance to the percentage break down other than to get a better picture of each school's environment.

Grad students add seriousness of purpose to an educational environment and add resources. Grad students also add more vitality & focused energy to a campus environment.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

Agreed. Berkeley blows away UVA in academic departments.

The book lists Berkeley's top programs as: Biological Science, Business, Chemistry, Computer Science, Economics, Engineering, English, and Psychology.

That’s a very small sampling of Cal’s strengths. Berkeley has top programs in almost all of its offerings. Way, way more than UVA. It isn’t even close. That is only gets a 4.5 star rating from this ranking is a joke.

Probably the impacted major thing plus the high % TAs teaching undergrads vs. profs

That and class sizes.

But I would think all this would apply to each of the big public universities. I personally don’t see UVA and UCLA offering a better academic experience than Berkeley. They are fantastic values, but that’s really a different thing. I would have all three at 4.5. And drop some of the other 4.5s to 4.0.

It’s worth remembering the authors of college guides want to sell books. And if all the top rated schools for actual academic experience are of small to medium undergrad size, they might have a reduced audience.

Maybe there should be different rankings for public universities vs private universities vs LACs. Similar to USNWR but with a category for national public unis. The trade offs and experiences are so different across the groups. Having different lists would force more reflection on what matters to a given student and family, rather than just automatically valuing the higher ranked thing when apples, oranges, and bananas are being compared.

+1

I started this thread. I agree with the above quoted post's suggestion that, among elite schools, Private National Universities should be viewed differently than Public National Universities for ranking purposes, and that LACs belong in a totally different category.

When all types of schools are combined, I think that the Wall Street Journal / Times Higher Education (WSJ/THE) rankings do a great job due to the focus on outcomes (heavier weighting for outcomes).

Also agree that families and students have different priorities for their undergraduate experience.

The problem with the THE/WSJ consolidated list is that their methodology was originally devised for comparing global universities where research is the priority. It’s really not well suited for LACs, which don’t exist in the UK (where THE is based.). This is why there are no LACs in their combined top 20 of US colleges. This should give pause when considering how LACs are entirely focused on undergrads, are half of the 20 best endowed colleges on a per student basis are LACs.

To be more specific, 30% of their weighting goes towards “Resources.” But that is weighted as 11% finance per student, 11% faculty per student, and 8% research papers per faculty. We know that papers per faculty is biased towards universities straight off. But the other 22% is also going to be misleading, because faculty and finances are not evenly split amongst grads and undergrads when both are present; there’s going to be far more money and faculty time spent on grad students than on undergrads on a per student basis. A compensating adjustment needs to be taking place but isn’t. (For me this was one of the key takeaways of the recent Columbia analysis of how their numbers were overstating undergrad investment… universities simply lack established conventions on how to do this; it’s less of an issue when comparing to other universities but distortions will be more pronounced when comparing to LACs where necessarily 100% of the funds and faculty focus go to educating the undergrad population).

I disagree as the methodology used by the WSJ/THE 2022 college rankings focuses on areas that are fair to both National Universities and to Liberal Arts Colleges.

The 4 weighted areas used: Outcomes 40%, Resources 30%, Engagement 20%, and Environment 10%

https://timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/wall-street-journal-times-higher-education-college-rankings-2022

In the case of an LAC, 100% of the resources (30%) go to the undergrads.

In the case of the university, we don’t really know how much of a budget or a professor’s office or research time goes to an undergrad vs the grad student, we only know they prioritize the latter but that the metrics used by WSJ don’t explain if or how they account for that difference.

You make very strong arguments in favor of SLACs with high endowments or high endowments per student (or am i reading too much into your well reasoned comments ?).

I agree that some will prefer a near 100% focus on undergraduate education in a more intimate setting rather than attending a much larger school with a significant presence of graduate students.

Among elite Private National Universities, some student populations are about 50% undergraduate and 50% graduate students (Northwestern University is an example where grad students may outnumber undergrads), but this provides more resources and engenders a serious academic environment.

It would be interesting to list the top 20 private National Universities by percentage of grad students & undergraduates.

You are not misreading, and I appreciate the kind words.

I don’t know of a listing that sorts NUs by undergrad percentage. However, my impression is that split was a factor many used when responding to the USNWR survey specifically asking for focus on undergrad teaching. You've probably seen it, but here's the link:

https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/undergraduate-teaching

I would agree NUs with a large percentage of undergrads offer an interesting compromise (as do LACs with traditions in encouraging undergrad research). Research opportunities can be very rewarding for the sufficiently motivated and undeterred. At the large universities, the trick it seems is not giving up after the first couple years of overpacked lecture halls and (comparatively) aloof profs.

I have several family members who have attended a variety of elite Private National Universities and experienced few large classes and many classes with fewer than 20 students--often fewer than 12 students. Northwestern, Chicago, Columbia, Duke, Brown, and a couple of others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

The book lists the top academic programs at Virginia as: Biomedical Engineering, Business, Computer Science, Economics, English, Global Studies, History, and "Political Philosophy, Policy, and Law".

The academic ratings are composed of ten factors: SAT /ACT of incoming students (a weakness at Berkeley), percentage of incoming students in top 10% of their high school class, student-to-faculty ratio (another weak area for Berkeley), class size (another weak area for Berkeley), full time faculty %, Faculty with terminal degrees, mean faculty salary, freshman retention rate, six year graduation rate, and "graduation performance"--includes several factors including Pell Grant recipient graduation rates.

Which makes it kind of useless, given that many schools are test optional which skews the SAT part, only public high schools have class rank, so that skews the top 10% part, faculty salary will vary by region and cost of the college plus endowments which has nothing to do with academics, and I'm not sure how useful separating out the graduation performance of Pell grant recipients speaks to academic quality of schools versus the economic reality of the students.

We need to stop pretending that shcool are bad or not worth attending if these lists don't cherry pick them. It is counterproductive to the country as a whole and to the mental health of our young adults.

90% of the colleges/universities in the US should be removed.
That should be much more productive to the country.
Too many worthless and uselss schools and money is wasted.

This is nuts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

Agreed. Berkeley blows away UVA in academic departments.

The book lists Berkeley's top programs as: Biological Science, Business, Chemistry, Computer Science, Economics, Engineering, English, and Psychology.

That’s a very small sampling of Cal’s strengths. Berkeley has top programs in almost all of its offerings. Way, way more than UVA. It isn’t even close. That is only gets a 4.5 star rating from this ranking is a joke.

Probably the impacted major thing plus the high % TAs teaching undergrads vs. profs

That and class sizes.

But I would think all this would apply to each of the big public universities. I personally don’t see UVA and UCLA offering a better academic experience than Berkeley. They are fantastic values, but that’s really a different thing. I would have all three at 4.5. And drop some of the other 4.5s to 4.0.

It’s worth remembering the authors of college guides want to sell books. And if all the top rated schools for actual academic experience are of small to medium undergrad size, they might have a reduced audience.

Maybe there should be different rankings for public universities vs private universities vs LACs. Similar to USNWR but with a category for national public unis. The trade offs and experiences are so different across the groups. Having different lists would force more reflection on what matters to a given student and family, rather than just automatically valuing the higher ranked thing when apples, oranges, and bananas are being compared.

+1

I started this thread. I agree with the above quoted post's suggestion that, among elite schools, Private National Universities should be viewed differently than Public National Universities for ranking purposes, and that LACs belong in a totally different category.

When all types of schools are combined, I think that the Wall Street Journal / Times Higher Education (WSJ/THE) rankings do a great job due to the focus on outcomes (heavier weighting for outcomes).

Also agree that families and students have different priorities for their undergraduate experience.

The problem with the THE/WSJ consolidated list is that their methodology was originally devised for comparing global universities where research is the priority. It’s really not well suited for LACs, which don’t exist in the UK (where THE is based.). This is why there are no LACs in their combined top 20 of US colleges. This should give pause when considering how LACs are entirely focused on undergrads, are half of the 20 best endowed colleges on a per student basis are LACs.

To be more specific, 30% of their weighting goes towards “Resources.” But that is weighted as 11% finance per student, 11% faculty per student, and 8% research papers per faculty. We know that papers per faculty is biased towards universities straight off. But the other 22% is also going to be misleading, because faculty and finances are not evenly split amongst grads and undergrads when both are present; there’s going to be far more money and faculty time spent on grad students than on undergrads on a per student basis. A compensating adjustment needs to be taking place but isn’t. (For me this was one of the key takeaways of the recent Columbia analysis of how their numbers were overstating undergrad investment… universities simply lack established conventions on how to do this; it’s less of an issue when comparing to other universities but distortions will be more pronounced when comparing to LACs where necessarily 100% of the funds and faculty focus go to educating the undergrad population).

I disagree as the methodology used by the WSJ/THE 2022 college rankings focuses on areas that are fair to both National Universities and to Liberal Arts Colleges.

The 4 weighted areas used: Outcomes 40%, Resources 30%, Engagement 20%, and Environment 10%

https://timeshighereducation.com/world-university-rankings/wall-street-journal-times-higher-education-college-rankings-2022

In the case of an LAC, 100% of the resources (30%) go to the undergrads.

In the case of the university, we don’t really know how much of a budget or a professor’s office or research time goes to an undergrad vs the grad student, we only know they prioritize the latter but that the metrics used by WSJ don’t explain if or how they account for that difference.

You make very strong arguments in favor of SLACs with high endowments or high endowments per student (or am i reading too much into your well reasoned comments ?).

I agree that some will prefer a near 100% focus on undergraduate education in a more intimate setting rather than attending a much larger school with a significant presence of graduate students.

Among elite Private National Universities, some student populations are about 50% undergraduate and 50% graduate students (Northwestern University is an example where grad students may outnumber undergrads), but this provides more resources and engenders a serious academic environment.

It would be interesting to list the top 20 private National Universities by percentage of grad students & undergraduates.

You are not misreading, and I appreciate the kind words.

I don’t know of a listing that sorts NUs by undergrad percentage. However, my impression is that split was a factor many used when responding to the USNWR survey specifically asking for focus on undergrad teaching. You've probably seen it, but here's the link:

https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/undergraduate-teaching

I would agree NUs with a large percentage of undergrads offer an interesting compromise (as do LACs with traditions in encouraging undergrad research). Research opportunities can be very rewarding for the sufficiently motivated and undeterred. At the large universities, the trick it seems is not giving up after the first couple years of overpacked lecture halls and (comparatively) aloof profs.

I have several family members who have attended a variety of elite Private National Universities and experienced few large classes and many classes with fewer than 20 students--often fewer than 12 students. Northwestern, Chicago, Columbia, Duke, Brown, and a couple of others.

I believe you, but I think it tends to be a bigger issue in the sciences where the large nature of certain introductory courses factors as much or more into the “weeding” than the course content. There’s some data for this in the CDS (assuming one isn’t dealing with a school that opts not to publish!).

Average class size data is useful but has to be considered carefully when schools report. A school that has 1 class of 99 students and 1 class of 1 student can claim an average class size of 50 even though 99% of the students experience double that. This is why one reason why some schools have so many barely attended classes. It pulls the average down in a way that may not represent the typical experience.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:The book notes 5 star UCLA's strongest programs as:

Computer Science, Engineering, English, Fine Arts, Mathematics, Performing Arts, Political Science, and Psychology.

UCLA seems like an interesting community.

Overall, this college guidebook loves the UC system with 4 UCs receiving the second highest academic rating (4.5 stars) and one (UCLA) receiving a full 5 star rating for academics.

Many seem to underestimate the quality of the University of Virginia. Univ. of Virginia is an outstanding university.

When I wrote the first two posts in this thread, I thought that there would be strong reaction to rating the academics of UC-Berkeley the same as for Boston University and the Univ. of Florida, and Boston College.

To really stir things up, I will list the SLACs that earned a 4.5 star academic rating (same as UC-Berkeley) :

Smith College, Wesleyan University, Bucknell University, Bates College, Univ. of Richmond, Scripps College, Colgate University, Colby College, Colorado College, College of the Holy Cross, Lafayette College, Union College, Vassar College, & Grinnell College.

Th three authors of the book all have earned doctorates--two PhDs and an EdD.

The thing is, a bachelor's degree is just not a big deal. Nearly any school has adequate resources to teach bachelors level material. If a student can find engaged faculty and peers and access to the programs that they are interested in, they can do great from anywhere. While I would never advise a kid to choose BU or UVA over Cal for a PhD program in most sciences, they can absolutely get just as good of an undergraduate education at any of these schools, and many, many others.

Regarding the assertion that "a bachelor's degree is just not a big deal", my response is that it can be depending upon the particular school and upon the particular major.

There are certain majors and certain schools which are "a big deal" at the undergraduate level.

My position is that if accepted to any of these schools, one should do everything within reason to attend:

Princeton, MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Yale, CalTech, Carnegie Mellon University, Harvey Mudd College, USMA at West Point, USNA at Annapolis, & the USAFA at Colorado Springs.

With respect to Selective Liberal Arts Colleges (SLACs):

If accepted to Amherst, Williams, Harvey Mudd, Claremont McKenna, any of the three main service academies, one should do everything within reason to attend assuming that the students accepted to Williams and/or Amherst are not also accepted to any of Harvard, MIT, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, Chicago, Duke, UPenn--especially the Wharton School of Business, or to any other top 25 National University including Georgetown and Virginia.

For some students, sure. For others, I would advise almost exactly the opposite. It comes down to matching the individual student to the environment that best fits their needs, imo.

I know some that thrive in large, anonymous environments. Or who want to go to a large school for a particular major (eg, engineering or a specialized business program.) Or who have no intention of being a top student in college and want to coast a bit more than some on reputation and “networking.” (No judgement!)

I know others who prefer small classes, or having long conversations with professors after class, or who want a small residential community where everyone lives on campus but without the fraternities/sororities of larger private schools.

There’s outcome data supporting top LACs (like grad school placement and even long term satisfaction in the form of alumni giving or reunion attendance) and there’s data supporting top universities (salary, particularly early, though the availability of engineering in universities might skew that some.)

It’s not one size fits all, and perhaps that’s a good thing.

I started this thread.

I agree with the above post except for one distinction:

A 2014 study done at Vanderbilt University broke down schools into 4 categories. I recall the top 3 categories as "Private National Universities", "Liberal Arts Colleges", and "Public National Universities".

The 2014 Vanderbilt study revealed that a higher percentage of students at major Private National Universities attend graduate school, next was SLACs, then major Public National Universities.

https://archive.ph/s0K2w Why You Can't Catch Up by Nancy Hass Aug. 1, 2014 citing a study done by Vanderbilt University economics and law professor Joni Hersch

Thanks for the interesting link.

I searched for the full paper and found this from 2019 (same author and title, just longer and more current):

https://deliverypdf.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=240069002121076005084000120114078075017073054032033092074008012074008126004024065069126000025041062008124018121065118085113126007080012013002115081114029027120003058038123017087018076029001030098119121069117102102095072104108126120024098108003098&EXT=pdf&INDEX=TRUE

If you look through the schools used for the groupings, you can find 40 in their tier 1 private research universities (r1 and r2) and 159 in the liberal arts college category! The 159 set is not what I meant by “top LACs.” Basically, they authors are comparing a group of universities that have already gone though a vetting to achieve r1 and r2 status to pretty much any school that wants to consider itself an LAC. Needless to say, this pulls down the LAC averages.

It’s hard to find reliable and consistently updated data for grad school placement, but I think the NSF comes closest with its PhD baccalaureate origins tables. Swarthmore does a nice service for the entire higher ed community summarizing it each year. I will post the link below. Note 20 of the top 30 for the all PhDs category are LACs (adjusted for school size of course.)

https://www.swarthmore.edu/sites/default/files/assets/documents/institutional-research/Doct%20Rates%20Top%20100%20Tot%20Sci%20Rankings%20-Summary%20to%202020.pdf

The obvious limitation here is not everyone is interested in a PhD. But it’s a good starting point for comparing grad school placement. Anecdotally, there seems to be fair correlation between most of the schools on this list with professional grad program placement. Which shouldn’t be surprising as PhD programs are among the most selective, in part cause they are generally funded… But of course everyone should check the schools their kids are interested in for themselves!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OOS students don't even need to bother applying to overcrowded UCLA or UCB
Many other better options.

Let all the Californians enjoy that.

UVA was also at the bottom of my kids list as my kid has lived in the suburban 'cities' in Fairfax county since birth.
Time to get out and explore
However I perfectly understand getting stuck in instate schools for financial reasons.

Totally agree and I'm from CA. I have a VA friend whose son just started at UC Santa Barbara. Of course I said congrats, but in my head I was thinking - haven't you read what a mess that school is right now! They can't offer enough classes for all students who want full time status to get it and are building those huge windowless pod dorms. But, yeah, the beach is pretty.

[Anonymous]

UC Berkeley

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

And, out comes the UVA troll…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

And, out comes the UVA troll…

as bad as the UVA booster

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

That's not true. It's far more selective with STEM admits than the college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:UC Berkeley

Is that a basketball stadium? Who are playing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

That's not true. It's far more selective with STEM admits than the college.

But that doesn't necessarily mean the programs are strong.

[Anonymous]

Can’t fault the SLAC list much, although I’d replace Davidson with Colby

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UVA is weak in STEM. So much for academic ratings. Another BS ranking.

Agreed. Berkeley blows away UVA in academic departments.

The book lists Berkeley's top programs as: Biological Science, Business, Chemistry, Computer Science, Economics, Engineering, English, and Psychology.

That’s a very small sampling of Cal’s strengths. Berkeley has top programs in almost all of its offerings. Way, way more than UVA. It isn’t even close. That is only gets a 4.5 star rating from this ranking is a joke.

Same goes for Michigan. Among public schools Berkeley, UCLA and Michigan are top tier. Other schools are a step below.. UVA is likely 0.5 points below the top tier mainly because of their weak engineering programs but can't be beat from a value perspective for in-state students.

+1