Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you care about endowment size , us news is for you. If you care about reputation among other college faculty times of London world rankings are for you. If you care about the academic strength of faculty and graduates Shanghai world academic is your ticket.

USNEWS doesn't help much on endowment - there are better rankings out there for endowment (I'm sure the Texas schools wished endowment = ranking)

http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/documents/local/college-endowments/761/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/top-college-endowments-per-student-in-2013/2014/01/28/ed582efe-881f-11e3-a5bd-844629433ba3_story.html

USNEWS is the gold standard ranking that people reference when they refer to Top 10, Top 25 etc. The other rankings are useful to some, but just not widely recognized even by schools.

Which people and in what context are they referencing US News when they refer to Top 10?

Anonymous wrote:If you care about endowment size , us news is for you. If you care about reputation among other college faculty times of London world rankings are for you. If you care about the academic strength of faculty and graduates Shanghai world academic is your ticket.

USNEWS doesn't help much on endowment - there are better rankings out there for endowment (I'm sure the Texas schools wished endowment = ranking)

http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/documents/local/college-endowments/761/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/top-college-endowments-per-student-in-2013/2014/01/28/ed582efe-881f-11e3-a5bd-844629433ba3_story.html

USNEWS is the gold standard ranking that people reference when they refer to Top 10, Top 25 etc. The other rankings are useful to some, but just not widely recognized even by schools.

If you care about endowment size , us news is for you. If you care about reputation among other college faculty times of London world rankings are for you. If you care about the academic strength of faculty and graduates Shanghai world academic is your ticket.

Anonymous wrote:UNWR flawed, yes. Influential, of course. Exhibit one, you all cared enough to comment.

Miley Cyrus is flawed and people talk about her a lot. I"m not sure I would call her influential.

Anonymous wrote:Umm, for every school that rises in the ranking, there must be one that slips. Yawn.

Back to teaching my statistics class. Seems we have a way to go.

Yes, but we must know. Has #83 slipped to #84? Much hangs in the balance.

Umm, for every school that rises in the ranking, there must be one that slips. Yawn.

Back to teaching my statistics class. Seems we have a way to go.

Anonymous wrote:It is not irrational to believe that some schools cheat - but those who get caught pay a reputational price, as GW did.

It is entirely rational and not dishonest for schools to honestly devote resources to improving the metrics USNEWS measures.

In either instance, the degree to which colleges focus on improving their USNEWS ranking proves that the rankings matter a lot to the schools.

Whether the rankings SHOULD matter is a philosophical debate, it is undeniable that. at present, the rankings matter a lot. I'd suggest that the reason the USNEWS rankings matter a lot is that a very significant number of "consumers" (i.e., prospective students and their parents) find the rankings reliable.

Is there any evidence for this? I wonder if it isn't more the case that many "consumers" talk about the rankings a great deal. That's good for US News, but I'm more interested in what prospective employers of college graduates and grad school admissions committees think.

It is not irrational to believe that some schools cheat - but those who get caught pay a reputational price, as GW did.

It is entirely rational and not dishonest for schools to honestly devote resources to improving the metrics USNEWS measures.

In either instance, the degree to which colleges focus on improving their USNEWS ranking proves that the rankings matter a lot to the schools.

Whether the rankings SHOULD matter is a philosophical debate, it is undeniable that. at present, the rankings matter a lot. I'd suggest that the reason the USNEWS rankings matter a lot is that a very significant number of "consumers" (i.e., prospective students and their parents) find the rankings reliable.

Anonymous wrote:"Game" is a loaded word, but it's undeniable that schools care about USNEWS - a lot.

Gaming is the right word for this situation. Consider the following quotes from the article:

"We have walked the fine line between illegal, unethical, and really interesting," said Clemson's former institutional researcher, Catherine Watt, who left the university in 2013, at a conference in 2009, according to Inside Higher Ed. Some might argue that they crossed that line a long time ago. But Clemson rose from 38th among public universities in 2001 to 21st last year.

". College admissions officers themselves suspect the dishonesty is more widespread: 91 percent said in a survey conducted by Gallup and Inside Higher Ed that other colleges (although not their own, of course) were probably lying too.

"It should be no surprise that colleges lie and cheat and game the system. That's not necessarily a reason the rankings shouldn't exist. If we got rid of programs because they could be gamed, we'd have no financial aid to attend college, no college admissions process — in fact, no social safety net.

"Game" is a loaded word, but it's undeniable that schools care about USNEWS - a lot.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UNWR flawed, yes. Influential, of course. Exhibit one, you all cared enough to comment.

Time to end the US News madness. Here's how:http://www.vox.com/2014/9/5/6106807/college-rankings-us-news-boston-clemson-problems?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=voxdotcom&utm_content=tuesday

As the article points out. Some schools pursue all kinds of strategies to game the rankings. These schools rise in the rankings artificially.

Better link: http://www.vox.com/2014/9/5/6106807/college-rankings-us-news-boston-clemson-problems?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=voxdotcom&utm_content=tuesday

Anonymous wrote:UNWR flawed, yes. Influential, of course. Exhibit one, you all cared enough to comment.

Time to end the US News madness. Here's how:http://www.vox.com/2014/9/5/6106807/college-rankings-us-news-boston-clemson-problems?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=voxdotcom&utm_content=tuesday

As the article points out. Some schools pursue all kinds of strategies to game the rankings. These schools rise in the rankings artificially.

UNWR flawed, yes. Influential, of course. Exhibit one, you all cared enough to comment.

Anonymous wrote:USNWR is a terrible measure now that you can compare head to head yields on sites.

For instance JHU (and i like jhu a lot) is not ranked that high for most kids and outside of BME will lose crossadmits everyday to Brown, COrnell, and NW.

Carnegie Mellon is criminally underrated.

How many people know how to get the data, much less compare head to head yields? The USNEWS are easy to access.

USNWR is a terrible measure now that you can compare head to head yields on sites.

For instance JHU (and i like jhu a lot) is not ranked that high for most kids and outside of BME will lose crossadmits everyday to Brown, COrnell, and NW.

Carnegie Mellon is criminally underrated.