Reply to Aggregate Global ranking of North American Universities

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I have responded more than once in this thread ("garbage in, garbage out").

Basing this ranking on 4 different rankings from around the world does not make sense because each rating & ranking system has its own categories--many of which are subjective including "academic reputation".

Rating & ranking schools is fine so long as the ranking system shares the methodology and the score for each rating category within that methodology. This allows readers and consumers to break out each category individually and rerank the schools based on a single rating factor. This way one can focus on the aspect--whether subjective or objective--that matters most to that consumer.

An objective factor that I find useful, but does not appear to be used by any of the four rankings system combined by bluesky, is a school's R&D (research & development) expenditures/budget for a particular year. The budget/expenditures is more important than publications because much research is done for private industry and, most likely, never published.[/quote]

Yes and no. I think that the real problem with this ranking is the continued perception that there is such a thing as ranking. These are all great universities, and how one would decide between them and many other great schools depends on what you are trying to get out of it. 
I agree with you that research is often under-prioritized, but total R&D expenditures distorts this in favor of the largest schools and those with medical schools since NIH funding makes up such a large proportion of R&D expenditures.  In reality Princeton and Rice have researchers who are just as brilliant and productive as those at Michigan and Wisconsin, there are just many fewer of them since the schools are smaller. But, they are competitive when trying to recruit faculty against the larger schools. R& D expenditures only captures part of the picture of the quality of research at a University.  [/quote]

R&D expenditures are an objective measure. The 4 rankings systems that are used by bluesky are rife with subjective categories that are weighted heavily in the rating & ranking methods.[/quote]

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