KQI

So I really love Brown, but my parents and family overall are stubborn and they just want me to go into Penn or Chicago because they are part of the 2008 US News Report "Top 10". I don't want to make the mistake of going to college just for numbers, and though the other 2 are great choices, I love Brown because of the Open Curriculum and the overall chill, happy environment.

So my question really is, does anybody have further statistics that place Brown above the "14th" place it has in the US News Report? I know that it was ranked 2nd for best undergraduate experience.... but in 1995. I know it's also #2 Happiest Students according to Princeton Review. What else do we know? Any stats on their graduate divisions as well, perhaps

wolfmanjack

First remind your parents that US News is a magazine. Second, find tons of articles criticizing U.S. News and show them to your parents. Thirdly, it's your life not theirs. Fourthly, well..you can show them this if it will help any: Revealed preference study ranks Brown seventh among selective universities - Campus News

dcircle

the consus group ranking is the most comprehensive (%50 is based on the average of all published rankings including U.S. News, 25% is selectivity, and 25% is yield):
brown ranks 8, penn is 11, and chicago is 48
Rankings | Colleges & Universities

arapollo

i wonder why chicago is ranked so high, i wonder if it is because of their high admissions rate

KQI

I wonder too

modestmelody

Chicago has a pretty high admit rate and a pretty low yield, so 50% of that score gets hurt pretty bad.

arapollo

what is yield? the amount of the students that stay in the school or, ?

modestmelody

Yield is the percentage of students who are admitted as freshman who attend in the fall.

arapollo

ooh thanks it would make sense, i am currently in a situation deciding between u chicago and brown. i personally think brown will open more doors because its ivy league ranking

wolfmanjack

ivy league is not a ranking it was a football league!

arapollo

i know i know, but come on no one really cares about ivy football besides the students that attend the institution in today's vernacular ivy league is clearly a ranking or type of prestige

tonyspizza1800

The link that wofmanjack provided shows that Brown is ranked 7th when it comes to where a student ultimately decides to go. This is a chart published in the New York Times (The New York Times > Week in Review > Image > Collegiate Matchups: Predicting Student Choices) in 2006 showing what percentage of students would choose X college over Y college. Brown loses out to only Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Stanford, and MIT (though do note that Caltech was not included in this particular study). 65% of cross admits between Brown and Penn choose Brown. Chicago was not included in the study, but according to the revealed preference study, Brown would also hold an edge over Chicago. Brown ranks very highly when it comes to where the cross admit actually decides to attend.

The Laissez-Faire Ranking of American Colleges puts Brown at 7th, Penn at 13th, and Chicago at 23rd.
http://collegeadmissions.tripod.com/...-1999-2000.txt

A college ranking from the Wall Street Journal based on the best "feeder schools"...schools that send the highest percentages of their students to the most esteemed grad schools...ranked Brown 12th, Chicago 14th, and Penn 16th. (CollegeJournal | Search rankings do include both national universities and liberal arts colleges, which might explain why these schools are ranked slightly lower than in other ranking systems.

The bottom line is, Brown performs better on many ranking systems than Chicago or Penn. Really, ranking systems shouldn't matter at all, if anything, in making decisions about where to go to college. But if this is what your parents care about, make sure they take a look at more than one ranking system. Make sure to note that ranking systems are different based on how much weight is given to different statistics. Most people agree that Penn does not belong in the top 5 universities in the nation, which is where it is ranked in the US News and World Report. Brown tops both Chicago and Penn in some ranking systems, but it depends on what the system is based on. Good luck convincing your parents!

wolfmanjack

I think you missed my point arapollo. I'm saying that "Ivy" is not a ranking it is just a remnant of history. It may be a status but there are plenty of other good schools that aren't Ivies and how many doors open for you probably won't change much from Uchic to Brown. It depends on which field you are going into and which schools have connections to those fields. More than anything, what really matters is you.

afan

I am sure your parents are just trying to help you make a wise choice. Tony offers great advice- the rankings depend on what is given high weights, vary depending on who generates the ranking, and ultimately do not determine the value of the experience for a given student.

So you may be better off changing the debate from the generic, and unresolvable "which is the best university" to "which is the best place for me to go to college". Investigate the programs, extracurriculars, and early career paths of students with your interests. You may find concrete information you can give them. You might even discover that you would really be better off somewhere else, but for good reasons, not some arbitrary ranking.

That said, here are two more "rankings" you can use

number of graduates who have received prestigious scholarships (Brown 7th, just ahead of Chicago, Penn not in the top 10)

http://www.k-state.edu/media/achieve...rstop10of5.pdf


percent of graduates who gone on to PhD's (Chicago is tops among these three, Brown lower, Penn much lower)

A ranking of colleges producing the highest % of Doctoral students

mia305

Chicago is all about academics. It scores low on student popularity-type measures because of where the campus is located and the academic rigor. Chicago doesnt appear to care much about the types of non-academic criteria that make up a part of the USNWR statistics. Penn is not as academically demanding (except possibly for Wharton). Its high USNWR ranking is attributable to grubbing to the USNWR statistics. Among other things they are probably the best at manipulatng admissions rates through ED. The on-campus activities make it more social than Chicago but it suffers from the same surrounding area blight. Of the three, Brown's at the other extreme. The non-academic quality of life is higher and it always scores well with students on those (and for that reason has a relatively large number of applications and a relatively low admit rate). Academic reputation, not so much.