Are At-Risk Students Bunnies to be Drowned?

[Zinhead]

@TomSrOfBoston -

Northeastern “gamed” their way up the rankings by raising admission standards, increasing retention and graduation rates and spending a billion dollars on the campus. They also got USNews to use the 6 year graduation rate due to the unique structure of the co-op program.

If you don’t like the term “gamed”, take it up with the former president of the university. He used that term. From the article:

Freeland swept into Northeastern with a brand-new mantra: recalibrate the school to climb up the ranks. “There’s no question that the system invites gaming,” Freeland tells me. “We made a systematic effort to influence [the outcome].” He directed university researchers to break the U.S. News code and replicate its formulas. He spoke about the rankings all the time—in hallways and at board meetings, illustrating his points with charts. He spent his days trying to figure out how to get the biggest bump up the charts for his buck. He worked the goal into the school’s strategic plan. “We had to get into the top 100,” Freeland says. “That was a life-or-death matter for Northeastern."

Universities can choose to play the rankings game or not. Northeastern decided to play with a vengeance, and it worked for them going from 162 to 47. Colleges who did not suffered. Take a look a Syracuse which traditionally has been a much more prestigious school than Northeastern. They ignored the USNRR, and fell from the low 50’s to 61 in the most recent rankings.