jbusc

The new number, as far as I can tell, does not include the President, Provost, or Dean (all of which are NAE members) and all of which are full time, tenured members of the engineering school.

I'm happy that any irregularities with USC's data have been corrected, but now I feel like it's gone too far the other way.

(unless that number does include them...but I don't know how to determine that)

Sam Lee

jbusc,

I counted 10 in April (see the CC thread referenced by the article). 3+10 = 13.

I am glad that USC fixed this so quickly. Among others ranked in the top-20, UCLA and UCSB also have unusually high %. Unlike USC, they don't put a list of NAE members on their website. It's much more difficult to cross-examine.

But one can be confident that their numbers are significantly overstated given the following:

According to NAE website:
University of California, Berkeley 75
University of California, Los Angeles 20
University of California, Santa Barbara 22
University of Minnesota 16

% listed on USN:
University of California, Berkeley 19.8%
University of California, Los Angeles 14.1%
University of California, Santa Barbara 15.3%
University of Minnesota 5.4%

Obviously, had Berkeley and Minn used 75 and 16 for USN, the % would be much higher than 19.8% and 5.4%. So it's apparent that they counted only the active full-time ones and did the right thing. By comparison, UCLA/UCSB's percentages seem to be significantly overstated.

UCBChemEGrad

Sam Lee is a girl!?

jbusc

Thanks. I withdraw my objection

It would be great, though, to check out those other schools NAE membership. All I can ask for is consistency in the process, even if I still think the system's broken.

I'm glad that they fixed it up quick too. They definitely found the right person to fast track this to - Dean Berti simply knows how to get things done around here. There's not a whole lot of people here who are able to get the dean on the phone instantly like that

Sam Lee

UCB,

Even my gender was under attack. That sounds "dramatic", "emotional", and "slanderous" enough.

jack63

After reading thru most of this thread, I must say I'm surprised. I'm surprised that the USC students or faculty on CC aren't more upset about what their University did.

Granted these NAE number issue isn't on the same order of magnitude as what is going on at Illinios urbana where students get let in because of political connections. In fact, most likely, most people will forget about this incident with USC in couple of years, but it is still nothing to defend.

If I were a student of faculty at USC, I'd be really upset. First, I think it would bother me that the university was so insistent on celebrating the big shots who are associated with the university, rather than celebrate some doctoral students research, some team of undergraduates senior project, or some professor who just got tenure.

Also, I would really want to ask "HOW MUCH WERE THESE NAE ADJUNCTS PAID FOR THEIR SERVICES?" Maybe I'm wrong, but I doubt they all took one dollar to give lectures at USC. They could have been paid loads, and this money could have had much better uses like scholarships for undergrads, fellowships for grad students, or a new tenure track faculty position.

jbusc

I don't know why I (a student) should feel upset. I've already explained how I think the system is flawed in the first place.

And I'm pleased with the speed with which the issue was resolved. USC moved very quickly to acknowledge and correct the mistake.

First guesstimate: minus $100 million

For example, Andrew Viterbi (one of the NAE members in question) is a USC Trustee and gave about $50 million to name the school after him and his wife. I am not particularly concerned about the direction of money flow in that case

doame

I'm surprised at this thread too. It wasn't titled "USC Incorrectly lists Deans, its President, Adjuncts, etc. (actual NAE members) when they technically shouldn't be listed." It doesn't say USC makes a mistake. or that the "USC Numbers are Flawed" .... It states "Ranking "Rigging" and is posted by a CC employee. Talk about implied intent. The immediate responses are AHA! a HUGE SCANDAL is revealed. I feel like I'm reading the National Enquirer.

USC listed NAE members affiliated with the university who surely contribute/have contributed, apparently when they were not within the guidelines. I for one feel there is a lot I could learn from a wise, established 90-something year old. Where did even a smidgen of respect go for learning from the wise? This excellent university immediately corrected the numbers. These educated, established Adjuncts should be paid to lecture. We pay our teachers last I looked.

No doubt this needed to be corrected, and I give Sam Lee credit for being nothing if not tenacious. At least his/her language is less inflamatory. But come on already. The "ratings" of universities definitely could be improved, but in a country that publishes the "The Most Beautiful Person on the Planet" on magazines everyone buys, I'd doubt it will stop. Perhaps it will get more accurate.

elixirs

I always found it strange that USC isn't in the T20 for undergrad engineering, but is somehow ranked 7th for grad this year. I highly doubt that USC = Caltech in terms of engineering strength!

QW553

I am not surprised to see U.S. News saying pretty much the same thing I said earlier. The ranking itself is not an accurate science, and there is no way to have the data from all schools 100% consistent. If USnews "really" asks for full-time employed NAEs, let's see how that piece of data changes in the next ranking. I personally know "many" NAEs from other schools do not even step on their campus 90% of the time, but they are still their most celebrated faculty members. That being said, the ranking won't change much even with "accurate" corrections.

Seeing many CCers poking their heads could not understand why USC engineering as a school ranks better than their individual departments, I'd like to shed some light on you. I said in one of my previous posts that, the ranking methodologies of schools and individual departments are DIFFERENT. The department ranking, and the undergrad ranking, are just a PA score. This score is being discussed in the "college search and selection" forum right now. I am not only talking about the shaft work done by the presidents of UFL and Clemson, the score itself is only a reflection of a few people's opinions, and their other unspoken motivations. It is more in tune with an earlier performance of a school, and has bias temporally and spatially. It is understandalbe that a longer-existing and earlier eastablished school gets favored. USC is a late comer in this arena. Also, due to the PA score's nature of subjectivity, the "shaft" exists more or less in every survey turned into USNews. Considering USC's rapidly upward trajectory in the ranking, hate and love with the public schools which are dominant in California, and stress with its peer schools in the ranking, I would say USC should be among the most "shafted" schools in the PA score.

Fortunately, USNews adds objective data into the formula ranking graduate engineering schools. It actually attempts to look at student's academic credential, school's resource, research capacity, etc. That is where USC gained points. I should point out that a couple of departments here are actually close to a top 10 ranking. The undergrad engineering is also around top 20, which is not bad to me.

BTW, looking at the schools ahead of CalTech in the ranking, which one dares to say they have better faculty and smarter students than CalTech does? But they rank ahead nonetheless, for a variety of reasons. Most of them are purely beneficial of their size. CMU's computer related departments may have hired more people than other's whole engineering schools. UIUC and Georgia Tech are famously for its size. I don't think they are even better than Cornell, let alone CalTech. But, hey, what can I complain?

QW553

I agree there is not much valuable materials in this 8-page thread, other than the national enquirer title. This one featuring in the front page does not sound right already. However, comparing with barrons' UF President cooks USNews Rankings, which is going on for 14 pages and 200 quality posts, discussing a related incident, it is even a crime done by Roger-Dooley, the administrator of this site. It reflects bad on the integrity and principle of this enterprise. The Roger-Dooley dude laid another egg asking CCers to do a survey for a fishy company, see Survey about College Search & Applications

QW553

Sam Lee,
Who attacked your gender? Did I say you lack of analytical thinking of an engineer, because you are a girl?

hyakku

I attend USC (I'll be a sophmore), and to answer a previous posters query about the students being more worried about attending school here or being "disappointed", I see my engineering friends (my best friend at SC is an engineer) and i have engineering friends in other schools, and I can say without a doubt that my SC friends work just as hard if not harder in their engineering program. Whether it's ranked higher or lower in a book is something that I've found is relatively unimportant in the top 40 schools, because after a point even smart kids can mess up a good thing.

I know the engineering program here is really rigorous and if people choose to believe an idea that this somehow tarnishes the work of the people that go here then I encourage you to overlook an amazing school for ranking envy, there will most certainly be someone to take your spot .

squadus

To sum it up, this thread is a basically a ploy to give USC negative attention

moshiz08

USC = illegit