CSM: College presidents plan 'U.S. News' rankings boycott

[siserune]

<p><a href=“johnwesley:”>quote</a></p>

<p>And, Xiggi is right, 1% of “mush” is still mush. Siserune’s reasoning is a defense of self-fulfilling prophecy, over the long-run, in perennial ranking systems.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I don’t think that’s what either xiggi or I said. </p>

<p>Where is the “self-fulfilling prophecy” in saying that PA aggregates data from a large number of factors not otherwise accounted for by US News, or that including PA stabilizes the rankings? For instance, the selectivity rankings are oversimplified, they use the raw acceptance rate (bad for self-selected schools like Caltech or a women’s college), while the perception of selectivity that shows up in the PA ratings will be closer to reality. Now, I personally would favor fixing this by measuring selectivity better with objective factors, but as things currently stand, PA is stabilizing the rankings. </p>

<p>

I would agree that the PA survey is superfluous but for the fact that it actually does cost the colleges somethng in work-hours spent assembling the answers to the surveys every year. That’s YOUR tuition money being spent to prop up a commercial venture that unlike other cooperative ventures with the business world, doesn’t even result in royalties to the college.

</p>

<p>So the free advertising to million$ of customers in US News does not result in royalties to the college?</p>