Help understanding college math program rankings

Math as career preparation does somewhat depend on in-major and related electives. Colleges can vary in what areas are covered (some types of courses may be in the math department or other departments). For example:

  • Pure math (pre-PhD). Subareas include analysis, algebra, topology, logic, etc..
  • Finance, actuarial, risk management.
  • Statistics or data science.
  • Computing (e.g. theory, cryptography).
  • Operations research (e.g. solving problems like scheduling aircraft, air crew, and ground crew within constraints of time and cost).
  • High school math teaching.