Category Archives: National Rankings

Forbes College Rankings 2015: Still Unfriendly to Public Universities

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The 2015 Forbes America’s Best Colleges rankings are out, and there is a new wrinkle in the methodology: The magazine “ran a targeted student satisfaction survey on Facebook. Respondents were asked where they attended school and how satisfied they were with their experience on a scale from 1 to 5.” The result yielded 2.5% of the total score, and was incorporated into the 25% subtotal in the “Student Satisfaction” metric.

We do not know exactly what “a targeted student satisfaction survey” is, but throwing something new into a ranking system helps to sustain interest. The survey didn’t help public universities overall. The average ranking of the public universities listed in the top 100 dropped more than 14 places in just two years. Only William & Mary rose during that time. Incredibly (literally), the Penn State ranking has fallen 59 places in two years; Maryland and Washington 20 and 21 places respectively. What could have happened in only two years to create such results?

For 2014, Forbes or, rather, the very conservative Center for College Affordability and Productivity (CCAP), which does the work for the magazine, increased the weight of the student debt factor from 17.5% to 25%.  At the same time, the weight for “Academic Success” went down modestly, from 11.25% to 10%.  Both of these probably hurt public universities: the debt, because state support still has not caught up with costs; the academic success because CCAP counts National Science Foundation Fellowships and Fulbright awards, many of which are won by students and faculty at public research universities.

(We have been and remain critical of the Forbes rankings, but at least they focus on outputs, however murky or dubious those may be. The do not use selectivity–an increasingly problematic U.S. News metric.)

In 2013, we wrote that the Forbes America’s Best Colleges rankings had suddenly become more friendly to public universities after several years of relegating many of them to the high three figures in the numerical rankings.  In that year, 19 public universities (not counting the military academies) made it into the top 100; in 2014, that number dropped to only 14. This year 13 were among the top 100.

Although UC Berkeley, UVA, Michigan, and North Carolina all improved slightly in 2015, they are still, on average, more than 10 places below where they were only two years ago.

It is not unusual for anyone who ranks or evaluates colleges to make changes in their ranking methodologies.  We have done the same for our curret edition of the Review, although we did not use numerical rankings this time around.

At least the bizarre rankings that marked the Forbes list for the first few years have mostly gone away.  No longer do we see, for example, a university ranked 320th one year and rise to 168th the next.  And it is good to keep in mind that the Forbes rankings lump all private and public universities and liberal arts colleges into one huge group; so a Forbes ranking of, say, 65 or 70 for a public university is a much stronger ranking than a U.S. News “national university ranking” in the same range.

Still, it is difficult to understand how some of the public universities could have dropped so far in just two or three years. The graduation rate value of 7.5% of the total, not adjusted for schools (e.g., Georgia Tech) with high numbers of engineering students, is punishing for some schools. Georgia Tech now has fallen 10 places since 2013, all the way down to 93.

Below are the Forbes rankings of public universities that were in the top 100 in 2013. The first parenthesis is the 2013 ranking, the second is the 2014 ranking, and the third is the 2015 ranking.

U.S. Military Academy— (7) (9) (11)

UC Berkeley— (22) (37) (35)

U.S. Naval Academy (28) (27) (27)

Virginia (29) (40) (36)

Michigan (30) (45) (41)

U.S. Air Force Academy (31) (34) (38)

UCLA (34) (44) (45)

UNC Chapel Hill (38) (50) (49)

William & Mary (44) (41) (39)

Illinois (53) (68) (68)

Washington (55) (73) (76)

UT Austin (66) (76) (82)

Wisconsin  (68) (70) (69)

Maryland  (73) (82) (93)

Florida (74) (87) (83)

Georgia Tech (83) (90) (93)

Georgia (90) (94) (102)

Penn State (93) (166) (152)

UC Santa Barbara (96) (116) (103)

Indiana (97) (107) (112)

UC Davis (99) (113) (121)

U.S. News National University Rankings, 2008-2015

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Be sure to check out the updated post, US News National University Rankings, 2012-2019. Latest rankings. US News has changed methodology for 2019 and there are some surprises after the first 35 places or so.

As promised, we are providing a table showing the U.S. News national university rankings from 2008–2015. Listed below are the yearly rankings of 125 national universities that were included in the first tier in all the years covered. Sixty three universities are public, and 62 are private.

There is now an updated list through 2018.

As a group, the private universities have had an average increase in the rankings of two places, while the public universities have had an average decline of three places, demonstrating what we have observed in the past–public universities are, in general, not on an upward trajectory in the rankings.

One reason for the phenomenon is increased “gaming” of the rankings. Some institutions, public and private, but mostly the latter, have geared their marketing and merit aid to increase the number of applicants and lower their acceptance rates accordingly. This makes them more “selective” and helps to improve their rankings. Northeastern University, for example, has risen an astonishing 54 places in the rankings since 2008 and is now ranked higher than Washington, Penn State, UT Austin, Wisconsin, Tulane, Florida, Pepperdine, George Washington, Maryland, Pitt, and many others. It is now tied with Illinois, UC Irvine, and RPI. How likely is it that in the space of eight years Northeastern has really improved from 96th to 42nd?

The U.S. News rankings not only over-emphasize the metrics related to a university’s financial resources but also, especially in the last five years or so, reward selectivity when, in fact, the results of the selectivity are already considered. Why should Stanford be rewarded for having an acceptance rate of 5% and be rewarded for having high graduation and retention rates, both of which are largely the result of selectivity. Using test scores as a factor in predicting what grad rates should be is fine, as is rewarding or penalizing schools for exceeding or not meeting such predictions. But the high scores themselves and the low acceptance percentages merely duplicate what is more properly measured by outcomes.

We will have more to say on these issues in the future. But for now, here are the historical rankings, the average of each school across eight years, and the increase or decline of each school from 2008 to the present. The universities are listed in order of their average ranking across the years.

Here is the list.

2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 Avg Rank Chg 08 vs 15
Princeton 1 2 1 2 1 1 1 1 1.25 0
Harvard 2 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 1.375 0
Yale 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 0
Stanford 4 4 4 5 5 6 5 4 4.625 0
Columbia 9 8 8 4 4 4 4 4 5.625 5
MIT 7 4 4 7 5 6 7 7 5.875 0
Penn 5 6 4 5 5 8 7 8 6 -3
Chicago 9 8 8 9 5 4 5 4 6.5 5
Caltech 5 6 4 7 5 10 10 10 7.125 -5
Duke 8 8 10 9 10 8 7 8 8.5 0
Dartmouth 11 11 11 9 11 10 10 11 10.5 0
Northwestern 14 12 12 12 12 12 12 13 12.375 1
Washington Univ 12 12 12 13 14 14 14 14 13.125 -2
Johns Hopkins 14 15 14 13 13 13 12 12 13.25 2
Cornell 12 14 15 15 15 15 16 15 14.625 -3
Brown 14 16 16 15 15 15 14 16 15.125 -2
Vanderbilt 19 18 17 17 17 17 17 16 17.25 3
Rice 17 17 17 17 17 17 18 19 17.375 -2
Notre Dame 19 18 20 19 19 17 18 16 18.25 3
Emory 17 18 17 20 20 20 20 21 19.125 -4
UC Berkeley 21 21 21 22 21 21 20 20 20.875 1
Georgetown 23 23 23 21 22 21 20 21 21.75 2
Carnegie Mellon 22 22 22 23 23 23 23 25 22.875 -3
Virginia 23 23 24 25 25 24 23 23 23.75 0
UCLA 25 25 24 25 25 24 23 23 24.25 2
USC 27 27 26 23 23 24 23 25 24.75 2
Wake Forest 30 28 28 25 25 27 23 27 26.625 3
Michigan 25 26 27 29 28 29 28 29 27.625 -4
Tufts 28 28 28 28 29 28 28 27 28 1
North Carolina 28 30 28 30 29 30 30 30 29.375 -2
Boston College 35 34 34 31 31 31 31 31 32.25 4
Brandeis 31 31 31 34 31 33 32 35 32.25 -4
William & Mary 33 32 33 31 33 33 32 33 32.5 0
NYU 34 33 32 33 33 32 32 32 32.625 2
Rochester 35 35 35 37 35 33 32 33 34.375 2
Georgia Tech 35 35 35 35 36 36 36 36 35.5 -1
UC San Diego 38 35 35 35 37 38 39 37 36.75 1
Lehigh 31 35 35 37 38 38 41 40 36.875 -9
Case Western 41 41 41 41 38 37 37 38 39.25 3
UC Davis 42 44 42 39 38 38 39 38 40 4
UW Madison 38 35 39 45 42 41 41 47 41 -9
UC Santa Barbara 44 44 42 39 42 41 41 40 41.625 4
Illinois 38 40 39 47 45 46 41 42 42.25 -4
RPI 44 41 42 41 50 41 41 42 42.75 2
Washington 42 41 42 41 42 46 52 48 44.25 -6
UC Irvine 44 44 46 41 45 44 49 42 44.375 2
Penn State 48 47 47 47 45 46 37 48 45.625 0
U of Miami 52 51 50 47 38 44 47 48 47.125 4
UT Austin 44 47 47 45 45 46 52 53 47.375 -9
Yeshiva 52 50 52 50 45 46 47 48 48.75 4
Florida 49 49 47 53 58 54 49 48 50.875 1
Tulane 50 51 50 51 50 51 52 54 51.125 -4
Boston Univ 57 60 56 56 53 51 41 42 52 15
George Washington 54 53 53 51 50 51 52 54 52.25 0
Ohio St 57 56 53 56 55 56 52 54 54.875 3
Pepperdine 54 56 58 53 55 54 57 54 55.125 0
Maryland 54 53 53 56 55 58 62 62 56.625 -8
Syracuse 50 53 58 55 62 58 62 58 57 -8
Fordham 67 61 61 56 53 58 57 58 58.875 9
Pitt 59 58 56 64 58 58 62 62 59.625 -3
Georgia 59 58 58 56 62 63 60 62 59.75 -3
SMU 67 66 68 56 62 58 60 58 61.875 9
Connecticut 64 66 66 69 58 63 57 58 62.625 6
Purdue 64 66 61 56 62 65 68 62 63 2
Texas A&M 62 64 61 63 58 65 69 68 63.75 -6
Clemson 67 61 61 64 68 68 62 62 64.125 5
WPI 62 71 68 64 62 65 62 68 65.25 -6
Rutgers 59 64 66 64 68 68 69 70 66 -11
Minnesota 71 61 61 64 68 68 69 71 66.625 0
Northeastern 96 96 80 69 62 56 49 42 68.75 54
Iowa 64 66 71 72 71 72 73 71 70 -7
Virginia Tech 71 71 71 69 71 72 69 71 70.625 0
Delaware 71 71 68 75 75 75 75 76 73.25 -5
Michigan St 71 71 71 79 71 72 73 85 74.125 -14
Brigham Young 79 113 71 75 71 68 62 62 75.125 17
Indiana 75 71 71 75 75 83 75 76 75.125 -1
Baylor 75 76 80 79 75 77 75 71 76 4
Miami Oh 67 66 77 79 90 89 75 76 77.375 -9
Marquette 82 77 84 75 82 83 75 76 79.25 6
Colorado School of Mines 75 80 77 72 75 77 91 88 79.375 -13
American 85 83 84 79 82 77 75 71 79.5 14
UC Santa Cruz 79 96 71 72 75 77 86 85 80.125 -6
Stevens Inst Tech 75 83 84 86 88 75 82 76 81.125 -1
Clark 91 80 88 86 94 83 75 76 84.125 15
Alabama 91 83 96 79 75 77 86 88 84.375 3
Colorado 79 77 77 86 94 97 86 88 85.5 -9
Binghamton 82 77 80 86 88 89 97 88 85.875 -6
Tulsa 91 83 88 93 75 83 86 88 85.875 3
Denver 85 89 84 86 82 83 91 88 86 -3
Vermont 96 89 88 94 82 92 82 85 88.5 11
St. Louis 82 80 84 86 88 92 101 99 89 -17
Auburn 96 96 88 85 82 89 91 103 91.25 -7
Drexel 108 89 88 86 88 83 97 95 91.75 13
Iowa St 85 89 88 94 94 101 101 106 94.75 -21
Stony Brook 96 96 96 99 111 92 82 88 95 8
Massachusetts Amherst 96 102 106 99 94 97 91 76 95.125 20
Missouri 91 96 102 94 90 97 97 99 95.75 -8
NC State 85 83 88 111 101 106 101 95 96.25 -10
TCU 108 113 110 99 97 92 82 76 97.125 32
Nebraska 91 89 96 104 101 101 101 99 97.75 -8
Kansas 85 89 96 104 101 106 101 106 98.5 -21
San Diego 107 102 110 94 97 92 91 95 98.5 12
UC Riverside 96 89 96 94 97 101 112 113 99.75 -17
Florida St 112 102 102 104 101 97 91 95 100.5 17
Tennessee 96 108 106 104 101 101 101 106 102.875 -10
New Hampshire 108 113 110 104 101 106 97 99 104.75 9
Oklahoma 108 108 102 111 101 101 101 106 104.75 2
Pacific 96 102 115 99 101 106 112 116 105.875 -20
Dayton 112 108 110 99 101 115 112 103 107.5 9
Illinois Tech 96 102 106 111 111 113 109 116 108 -20
Oregon 112 108 115 111 101 115 109 106 109.625 6
South Carolina 112 108 110 111 111 115 112 113 111.5 -1
Loyola Chicago 112 116 119 117 119 106 101 106 112 6
Arizona 96 96 102 120 124 120 119 121 112.25 -25
Univ at Buffalo 118 121 121 120 111 106 109 103 113.625 15
Howard 96 102 96 104 111 120 142 145 114.5 -49
Catholic 112 116 121 120 119 120 121 116 118.125 -4
Michigan Tech 124 121 121 117 111 120 117 116 118.375 8
Washington St 118 116 106 111 115 125 128 138 119.625 -20
Clarkson 124 121 119 124 119 115 121 121 120.5 3
Ohio Univ 112 116 115 124 124 131 135 129 123.25 -17
Kentucky 118 116 128 129 124 125 119 129 123.5 -11
Colorado St 124 125 128 124 128 134 121 121 125.625 3
Arkansas 124 125 128 132 132 134 128 135 129.75 -11
Arizona St 124 121 121 143 132 139 142 129 131.375 -5

Times Higher Ed World Rankings 2014-2015: Top Engineering and Tech Universities

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The most recent Times Higher Ed World University Rankings list the best universities for science and technology, and 13 U.S. universities are among the top 20. An additional eight U.S. schools made the top 50. Public universities are very well represented in the rankings.

The Times rankings are based on the following criteria:

  • Teaching: the learning environment (worth 30 per cent of the overall ranking score)
  • Research: volume, income and reputation (worth 30 per cent)
  • Citations: research influence (worth 30 per cent)
  • Industry income: innovation (worth 2.5 per cent)
  • International outlook: staff, students and research (worth 7.5 per cent).

Here are the top 20 universities for engineering and technology:

1. MIT

2. Stanford

3. Caltech

4. Princeton

5. Cambridge

6. Imperial College London

7. Oxford

8. Swiss Federal Institute Zurich

9. UCLA

10. UC Berkeley

11. Georgia Tech

12. Ecole Polytechnique Lausanne

13. National University of Singapore

14. UT Austin

15. Michigan

16. Carnegie Mellon

17. Cornell

18. Illinois

19. Northwestern

19. Delft University of Technology

The following U.S. universities are among the top 50 in the world in engineering and technology:

22. UC Santa Barbara

27. UW Madison

32. Columbia

33. Washington

40. Rice

45. Purdue

49. Minnesota

50. UC San Diego

U.S. News Rankings at Odds with Quality of Academic Departments

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Comparing the departmental rankings of leading public research universities to the overall rankings of the same schools by U.S. News yields striking disparities, emphasizing the impact that selectivity, class size, and financial resources have on the U.S. News listings, to the detriment of other factors.

(See also Rankings, Academic Departments: Private Elites vs Publics.)

As we have pointed out elsewhere, honors students have fewer concerns about class size because honors classes in the first two years tend to be much smaller than regular classes; and while selectivity is a driver of graduation rates, honors students have a six-year rate average grad rate approaching 90 percent in major public honors programs, with many significantly higher than 90 percent.

We have also commented before that the strong faculties at leading public research universities are competitive with many private elite national universities.  Soon we will update our post that compares the most recent departmental rankings of both public and private research universities.   In the meantime, below are the public research universities with the highest overall departmental rankings, listed along with their U.S. News ranking to illustrate the disparities.

The fifteen disciplines surveyed are business (undergrad); engineering (undergrad); biological sciences; chemistry; computer science; earth sciences; economics; education; English; history; math; physics; political science; psychology; and sociology.

Please note that many universities with highly-ranked academic departments (e.g., Indiana, Minnesota) do not have correspondingly high rankings in U.S. News.  The converse is also true: some highly ranked universities (e.g., Virginia) don’t have the highest ranked academic departments.

One of the main reasons for this kind of discrepancy is that U.S. News emphasizes selectivity and small class sizes, and some public universities with extremely strong faculties are not highly selective (Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, Washington) or have larger classes than many other universities.  But many class sections over the first two years, normally large for non-honors students, are usually much smaller for honors students. The takeaway for prospective honors students: selectivity for the university as a whole and the size of all classes at the university are less important for you than for non-honors students.

We certainly recognize the excellent instruction that occurs at, for example, William & Mary, Wake Forest, Lehigh, Carlton, Swarthmore, Williams, etc., regardless of whether or how highly their academic departments are rated.  But for highly qualified students who are looking at large research universities, we do believe the rankings of departments matters quite a bit.

Not included below are universities that do not have ranked departments in at least 13 of the 15 academic disciplines.  Notable among these is Georgia Tech, with its nationally renowned engineering programs and a very strong business department.

UC Berkeley has an average national departmental ranking of 3.33 across the 15 disciplines mentioned above.  Please bear in mind that the rankings below include all national universities, public and private.  All of the top five universities below–UC Berkeley, Michigan, Wisconsin, UCLA, and UT Austin–have no academic departments among the 15 disciplines surveyed that are ranked lower than 30.

University U.S. News Rank Avg Natl Dept Rank
UC Berkeley 20 3.33
Michigan 29 9.40
Wisconsin 47 12.40
UCLA 23 12.43
UT Austin 53 14.93
Illinois 42 19.47
Washington 48 21.33
Minnesota 71 23.13
Ohio State 54 26.27
Indiana 76 26.43
North Carolina 30 26.53
Penn State 48 26.53
Maryland 62 28.33
UC Davis 38 28.57
UC San Diego 37 28.80
Virginia 23 33.60
UC Irvine 42 34.33
Colorado 88 36.93
Arizona 121 37.53
UC Santa Barbara 40 37.86
Purdue 62 42.20
Texas A&M 68 44.00
Florida 48 44.47
Rutgers 70 45.60
Stony Brook 88 47.00

Here’s The Business Journals’ New Top 100 Public Colleges–and our Analysis

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Here’s another college ranking–The Business Journals Public College Rankings 2015.  The rankings are interesting for a number of reasons, but they are also on the quirky side, given that 45% of the weight comes from campus and area demographic data, including racial and gender diversity, employment rates, rental costs, the percentage of college grads and share of young adults in the community, and Kiplinger-like assessments of cost vs. value.  About 55% of the weight comes from more traditional ranking topics: selectivity, grad and retention rates, and academic prestige.

Think of the TBJ rankings as Kiplinger meets Washington Monthly, via U.S. News and Forbes.

As we have noted elsewhere, ordinal rankings assign places based on minute differences in final calculations, and the actual differences between the top 3 in the TBJ rankings is 1.12 points out of 100.  Yet like most rankings and ratings, they are interesting and have some value, especially for those who want to a synthesis of the four main rankings.  The TBJ rankings based academic prestige on such a synthesis.

At the top of the list are few surprises, except that the usual rank order of the top 5 has shifted; Michigan is number 1, North Carolina, 2, followed by UVA, 3, William & Mary, 4, and UC Berkeley, 5.

 Below is a list of the 19 ranking categories, followed by a list of the top 100 public colleges, according to TBJ:

1. Admission rate (selectivity, 5 percent): The percentage of first-time undergraduate applicants who were admitted to the school.

2. Admission test score at the 25th percentile (5 percent).

3. Admission test score at the 75th percentile (5 percent).

4. Retention rate (10 percent).

5. Four-year graduation rate (10 percent).

6. Six-year graduation rate (5 percent).

7. Rankings by Forbes, Kiplinger’s, U.S. News and World Report, and Washington Monthly (prestige, 15 percent). The school’s performances in the latest rankings by these four publications, converted to a 400-point scale

8. Quality-affordability ratio (10 percent). The published in-state tuition, fees, room and board charges for 2013-14, divided by the sum of the school’s raw scores for selectivity, advancement and prestige.

9. Average net price for full-time undergraduates receiving grants or scholarships (5 percent).

10. Median monthly off-campus rent (5 percent): The median rent for all rental properties within the metropolitan area in which the school is located.

11. Share of undergraduates with out-of-state addresses (5 percent).

12. Racial diversity of student body (2.5 percent).

13. Racial diversity of faculty (2.5 percent). The Gini-Simpson index for the instructional staff, a measure that indicates the likelihood that two randomly selected instructors would be of different races.

14. Gender diversity of student body (2.5 percent).

15. Gender diversity of faculty (2.5 percent): The difference between the percentage of female instructional staffers and the female share of all 25- to 64-year-olds (50.59 percent).

16. Share of young adults (2.5 percent).

17. Unemployment rate for young adults (2.5 percent).

18. Share of young adults with bachelor’s degrees (2.5 percent).

19. Share of local jobs that are classified as management, business, science or arts jobs (2.5 percent).

The top 100 rankings…

• 1. University of Michigan (Michigan)

• 2. University of North Carolina (North Carolina)

• 3. University of Virginia (Virginia)

• 4. College of William and Mary (Virginia)

• 5. University of California-Berkeley (California)

• 6. University of California-Los Angeles (California)

• 7. University of Florida (Florida)

• 8. University of Maryland (Maryland)

• 9. University of Washington (Washington)

• 10. University of Wisconsin (Wisconsin)

• 11. University of Illinois (Illinois)

• 12. University of Texas (Texas)

• 13. Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia)

• 14. University of California-San Diego (California)

• 15. Ohio State University (Ohio)

• 16. University of Georgia (Georgia)

• 17. University of Minnesota (Minnesota)

• 18. Binghamton University (New York)

• 19. University of Connecticut (Connecticut)

• 20. Texas A&M University (Texas)

• 21. University of California-Santa Barbara (California)

• 22. Indiana University (Indiana)

• 23. North Carolina State University (North Carolina)

• 24. Virginia Polytechnic Institute (Virginia)

• 25. University of California-Irvine (California)

• 26. Pennsylvania State University (Pennsylvania)

• 27. University of Delaware (Delaware)

• 28. Purdue University (Indiana)

• 29. University of Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania)

• 30. Rutgers University (New Jersey)

• 31. Florida State University (Florida)

• 32. Stony Brook University (New York)

• 33. Clemson University (South Carolina)

• 34. University of California-Davis (California)

• 35. SUNY Geneseo (New York)

• 36. College of New Jersey (New Jersey)

• 37. Michigan State University (Michigan)

• 38. University of Iowa (Iowa)

• 39. James Madison University (Virginia)

• 40. Truman State University (Missouri)

• 41. Miami University (Ohio) (Ohio)

• 42. University of Vermont (Vermont)

• 43. University of South Carolina (South Carolina)

• 44. Iowa State University (Iowa)

• 45. University of Missouri (Missouri)

• 46. University of Texas at Dallas (Texas)

• 47. University at Buffalo (New York)

• 48. University of Massachusetts (Massachusetts)

• 49. University of North Carolina at Wilmington (North Carolina)

• 50. New College of Florida (Florida)

• 51. Baruch College (New York)

• 52. Auburn University (Alabama)

• 53. Colorado School of Mines (Colorado)

• 54. University of Utah (Utah)

• 55. University of Colorado (Colorado)

• 56. California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo (California)

• 57. University of Oklahoma (Oklahoma)

• 58. University of Alabama (Alabama)

• 59. University of Arkansas (Arkansas)

• 60. San Diego State University (California)

• 61. University of California-Santa Cruz (California)

• 62. George Mason University (Virginia)

• 63. University of South Florida (Florida)

• 64. University at Albany (New York)

• 65. SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry (New York)

• 66. Appalachian State University (North Carolina)

• 67. University of Mary Washington (Virginia)

• 68. University of New Hampshire (New Hampshire)

• 69. St. Mary’s College of Maryland (Maryland)

• 70. Arizona State University (Arizona)

• 71. Louisiana State University (Louisiana)

• 72. SUNY New Paltz (New York)

• 73. University of Nebraska (Nebraska)

• 74. University of Kansas (Kansas)

• 75. Hunter College (New York)

• 76. University of Oregon (Oregon)

• 77. University of Mississippi (Mississippi)

• 78. University of Maryland Baltimore County (Maryland)

• 79. University of Arizona (Arizona)

• 80. College of Charleston (South Carolina)

• 81. Colorado State University (Colorado)

• 82. University of Minnesota-Morris (Minnesota)

• 83. University of Central Florida (Florida)

• 84. University of Tennessee (Tennessee)

• 85. University of Wisconsin-La Crosse (Wisconsin)

• 86. Ramapo College of New Jersey (New Jersey)

• 87. Virginia Military Institute (Virginia)

• 88. University of California-Riverside (California)

• 89. Citadel Military College of South Carolina (South Carolina)

• 90. Oklahoma State University (Oklahoma)

• 91. University of North Carolina at Asheville (North Carolina)

• 92. Queens College (New York)

• 93. Oregon State University (Oregon)

• 94. Mississippi State University (Mississippi)

• 95. SUNY Oneonta (New York)

• 96. City College of New York (New York)

• 97. Purchase College (New York)

• 98. University of Wyoming (Wyoming)

• 99. Missouri University of Science and Technology (Missouri)

• 100. Towson University (Maryland)

The Academic Reputation Ranking in U.S. News: What It Means for Honors Students

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Editor’s Note: This post was updated on August 15, 2017, to include new honors class size averages based on our most recent data.

In a previous post, Based on Academic Reputation Alone, Publics Would Be Higher in U.S. News Rankings, we write that many public universities have a reputation in the academic community that is much higher than their overall ranking by U.S. News.  In this post, we will summarize the reasons that prospective honors students and their parents might consider paying more attention to academic reputation than to other factors in the oft-cited rankings.

(Another related post: Alternative U.S. News Rankings: Lots of Surprises.)

First, these are factors to consider if the state university’s academic reputation is much stronger than its overall ranking:

1.  The overall rankings penalize public universities for their typically larger class sizes, but the average honors class size in the 50 major honors programs we track is 26.3 students, much smaller than the average class size for the universities as a whole.  Most of these honors classes are lower-division, where the preponderance of large classes is often the norm. First-year honors seminars and classes for honors-only students average 19 students per section.  Result:  the relatively poor rating the whole university might receive for class size is offset for honors students.

2.  The overall rankings hit some public universities hard for having relatively low retention and graduation percentages, but freshmen retention rates in honors programs are in the 90% range and higher; meanwhile six-year grad rates for honors entrants average 89%–much higher than the average rates for the universities as a whole.  Result: the lower rates for the universities as a whole are offset for honors students.

3.  All public universities suffer in the overall rankings because U.S. News assigns ranking points for both the wealth of the university as a whole and for the impact that wealth has on professors’ salaries, smaller class sizes, etc.  This is a double whammy in its consideration of inputs and outputs separately; only the outputs should be rated.  Result: the outputs for class size (see above) are offset for honors students, and the wealth of the university as an input should not be considered in the first place.

4.  For highly-qualified students interested in graduate or professional school, academic reputation and the ability to work with outstanding research faculty are big advantages. Honors students have enhanced opportunities to work with outstanding faculty members even in large research universities, many of which are likely to have strong departmental rankings in the student’s subject area.  Result: honors students are not penalized for the research focus of public research universities; instead, they benefit from it.

5.  Many wealthy private elites are generous in funding all, or most, need-based aid, but increasingly offer little or no merit aid.  This means that families might receive all the need-based aid they “deserve” according to a federal or institutional calculation and still face annual college costs of $16,000 to $50,000.  On the other hand, national scholars and other highly-qualified students can still receive significant merit aid at most public universities.  Result: if a public university has an academic reputation equal to that of a wealthy private elite, an honors student could be better off financially and not suffer academically in a public honors program.

But…what if the academic reputation of the public university is lower than that of a private school under consideration?   In this case, the public honors option should offer the following offsets:

1. The net cost advantage of the public university, including merit aid, probably needs to be significant.

2.  It is extremely important to evaluate the specific components of the honors program to determine if it provides a major “value-added” advantage–is it, relatively, better than the university as a whole.  Typically, the answer will be yes.  To determine how much better, look at the academic disciplines covered by the honors program, the actual class sizes, retention and graduation rates, research opportunities, and even honors housing and perks, such as priority registration.

Princeton Review: Indiana, Iowa State, Michigan, UT Austin “Great Schools” for Business Majors

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The 2015 edition of the Princeton Review takes the most popular college majors and then matches them with the 20 leading universities for those majors, as determined by student surveys and by advisers that the Review uses to assist with the rankings.

Four public universities–Indiana, Iowa State, Michigan, and UT Austin–made the top 20 lists for all three business-related majors covered by the Review: Accounting, Business/Finance, and Marketing.

In addition, James Madison University, the University of Houston, Michigan State, and Miami University made the top 20 lists in at least two of the business-related fields:

James Madison and the University of Houston–accounting and marketing; Michigan State–accounting and business/finance; and Miami University–business/finance and marketing.

Fifteen additional public universities made one of the top 20 lists:

Clemson, College of Charleston, Penn State, Temple, Texas A&M, Illinois, and UT Dallas–accounting.

Arizona State, Christopher Newport, CUNY Baruch, CUNY Brooklyn, Florida State, Portland State, Ohio University, and UC Berkeley–business/finance.

Central Florida, South Florida, and Mississippi–marketing.

 

 

 

 

 

Honors Programs with Lots of Honors Courses–and Small Classes

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We measure eight characteristics of the 50 honors programs we recently reviewed,  but two of those characteristics–the number of honors courses and the size of honors classes–may be the most important for most parents and prospective students.

In our review, we use a scale of  2 to 5 “mortarboards” to rate the eight characteristics: (1) honors completion requirements; (2)the range and type of honors classes; (3) the average enrollment in honors class sections; (4) honors graduation rates; (5) ratio of honors students to honors staff; (6) honors housing; (7) prestigious awards earned by students; and (8) the availability of priority registration for classes.

In this post, we will focus on numbers 2 and 3 above, bearing in mind that a rating of 5 mortarboards is the highest possible rating, while a rating of 4.5 mortarboards is also outstanding.

When it comes to the highest achievement in both the range and type of honors classes and the availability of small honors classes, only one honors college received the highest rating possible–5 mortarboards–in both categories.   With an impressive range of honors interdisciplinary seminars to go along with almost 70 department honors courses, the University of Mississippi’s Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College certainly has a lot of honors courses to choose from, along with an average honors class size of fewer than 15 students per section.

Here are nine other honors colleges and programs that have at least a 4.5 rating in both the range and type of courses offered and the average size of honors classes.  Note: an average class size rating of 5.0 means the average class size is 15 students or fewer, and a 4.5 rating means that the average honors class size is 20 students or fewer.

Alabama Honors College: range and type of honors courses=5.0; class size=4.5

Arizona State Barrett Honors College: range and type of honors courses=5.0; class size=4.5

Indiana Hutton Honors College: range and type of honors courses=5.0; class size=4.5

Mississippi SMBHC: range and type of honors courses=5.0; class size=5.0

Penn State Schreyer Honors College: range and type of honors courses=5.0; average class size=4.5

South Carolina Honors College: range and type of honors courses=5.0; average class size=4.5

Temple University Honors Program: range and type of honors courses=5.0; average class size=4.5

UCLA Honors Program: range and type of honors courses=5.0; average class size=4.5

Colorado State Honors Program: range and type of honors courses=4.5; average class size=4.5

Texas Tech Honors College: range and type of honors courses=4.5; average class size=4.5

It is no coincidence that only one of the programs listed above has an overall honors rating (all 8 categories) of less than 4.0, and most have an overall rating of 4.5 or 5.0.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Best Value-Added Honors Programs 2014

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Part of our rating of honors colleges and programs involves a statistical comparison of the honors rating to the perception of the university as a whole.  The “perception” baseline is the U.S. News ranking of the university, although we certainly do not believe that the magazine ranking is accurate or definitive when it comes to many public universities.

On a scale of 5, here are the comparative ratings for 11 honors programs that provide the most significant “value-added” component to the universities of which they are a part:

Arizona State, Barrett Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=2.5; Honors Rating=5.

Mississippi, Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=2.0; Honors Rating=4.5

Texas Tech Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=2.0; Honors Rating=4.5

Univ of Arkansas Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=2.5; Honors Rating=4.5

Ohio University Honors Tutorial College: U.S. News University Ranking=2.5; Honors Rating=4.5

Oregon State, University Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=2.5; Honors Rating=4.5

South Carolina Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=3.0; Honors Rating=5.0

Kansas (KU) Honors Program: U.S. News University Ranking=3.5; Honors Rating=5.0

Oregon, Clark Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=3.0; Honors Rating=4.5

Oklahoma State Honors College: U.S. News University Ranking=2.5; Honors Rating=4.0

Temple University Honors Program: U.S. News University Ranking=3.0; Honors Rating=4.5

U.S. News Rankings 2015: Another Down Year for Many Public Universities

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Now that the U.S. News Best Colleges edition for 2015 is in our midst, we will continue our yearly saga of reporting the ranking trends for major public universities.  The short version: 2015 is another bad year for publics, reminiscent of 2013.  The 2014 edition showed some minor gains among public universities. (Here’s a related post: Alternative U.S. News Rankings: Lots of Surprises.)

The 2014 rankings showed gains by 23 of the 50 schools we follow most closely, while 19 declined and 8 remained the same.  But the new 2015 edition shows a decline for a whopping 26 public universities out of the 50, gains for 18, and no change for 6.

Penn State paid for the big gain it made in 2014, dropping 11 places from 37 to 48.  Does anyone really believe Penn State has changed that much in one year?  Maybe UMass fans think the rankings are great in 2015: their school improved from 91 to 76.

The UC campuses continue to do very well, however, with increases for most and with UCLA holding its own.

We could go on and say who the alleged “winners” and “losers” are in 2015, but have a look below and you’ll find out, and not just for 2015.  We list the rankings for the last four years so readers will have a better sense of the roller coaster ride that some schools are going through.

Below are the 50 universities we follow, showing by the symbols (-, +, or +) whether they fell, stayed the same, or gained in the rankings.  We also list each school’s rankings for a three-year span: 2012, 2013, and 2014.  Schools with larger gains are listed in caps.

-Alabama—2015 (88); 2014 (86); 2013 (77); 2012 (75)

-Arizona—2015 (121); 2014 (119); 2013 (120); 2012 (124)

+ARIZONA STATE—2015 (126); 2014 (142); 2013 (139); 2012 (132)

-Arkansas—2015 (135); 2014 (128); 2013 (134); 2012 (132)

–Auburn—2015 (103);2014 (91); 2013 (89); 2012 (82)

+BINGHAMTON—2015 (88); 2014 (97); 2013 (89); 2012 (90)

=Clemson—2015 (62); 2014 (62); 2013 (68); 2012 (68)

-Colorado—2015 (88); 2014 (86); 2013 (97); 2012 (94)

-Connecticut–2015 (58); 2014 (57); 2013 (63); 2012 (58)

-Delaware—2015 (76); 2014 (75); 2013 (75); 2012 (75)

+FLORIDA–2015 (48); 2014 (49); 2013 (54); 2012 (58)

-Georgia—2015 (62); 2014 (60); 2013 (63); 2012 (62)

=Georgia Tech—2015 (36); 2014 (36); 2013 (36); 2012 (36)

-Illinois—2015 (42); 2014 (41); 2013 (46); 2012 (42)

-Indiana—2015(76); 2014 (75); 2013 (83); 2012 (75)

+IOWA—2015 (71); 2014 (73); 2013 (72); 2012 (71)

-Iowa State—2015 (106); 2014 (101); 2013 (101); 2012 (97)

-Kansas—2015 (106); 2014 (101); 2013 (106); 2012 (101)

=Maryland—2015 (62); 2014 (62); 2013 (58); 2012 (55)

+MASSACHUSETTS—2015 (76); 2014 (91); 2012 (97); 2012 (94)

-Michigan—2015 (29); 2014 (28); 2013 (29); 2012 (28)

–Michigan State—2015 (85); 2014 (73); 2013 (72); 2012 (71)

-Minnesota—2015 (71); 2014 (69); 2013 (68); 2012 (68)

+Mississippi—2015 (149); 2014 (150); 2013 (151); 2012 (143)

-Missouri—2015 (99); 2014 (97); 2013 (97); 2012 (90)

+NEBRASKA—2015 (99); 2014 (101); 2013 (101); 2012 (101)

=North Carolina—2015 (30); 2014 (30); 2013 (30); 2012 (29)

+NC STATE—2015 (95); 2014 (101); 2013 (106); 2012 (101)

-Ohio State—2015 (54); 2014 (52); 2013 (56); 2012 (55)

+OREGON—2015 (106); 2014 (109); 2013 (115); 2012 (101)

–Penn State—2015 (48); 2014 (37); 2013 (46); 2012 (45)

=Pitt—2015 (62); 2014 (62); 2013 (58); 2012 (58)

+PURDUE—2015 (62); 2014 (68); 2013 (65); 2012 (62)

-Rutgers—2015 (70); 2014 (69); 2013 (68); 2012 (68)

-South Carolina—2015 (113); 2014 (112); 2013 (115); 2012 (111)

-Stony Brook—2015 (88); 2014 (82); 2013 (92); 2012 (111)

+TEXAS A&M—2015 (68); 2014 (69); 2013 (65); 2012 (58)

+UC DAVIS—2015 (38); 2014 (39); 2013 (38); 2012 (38)

+UC IRVINE—2015 (42); 2014 (49); 2013 (44); 2012 (45)

=UC Los Angeles 2015 (23); 2014 (23); 2013 (24); 2012 (25)

+UC SAN DIEGO—2015 (37); 2014 (39); 2013 (37); 2012 (38)

+UC SANTA BARBARA—2015 (40); 2014 (41); 2013 (41); 2012 (42)

+UNIVERSITY AT BUFFALO—2015 (103); 2014 (109); 2013 (106); 2012 (111)

–UT Austin—2015 (53); 2014 (52); 2013 (46); 2012 (45)

-Vermont—2015 (85); 2014 (82); 2013 (92); 2012 (82)

=Virginia—2015 (23); 2014 (23); 2013 (24); 2012 (25)

-Virginia Tech—2015 (71); 2014 (69); 2013 (72); 2012 (71)

+WASHINGTON–2015 (48); 2014 (52); 2013 (46); 2012 (42)

–Washington State—2015 (138); 2014 (128); 2013 (125); 2012 (115)

-Wisconsin—2015 (47); 2014 (41); 2013 (41); 2012 (42)