Forbes Best Colleges 2015

micmatt513
Tue, 11 Aug 2015 14:31:58 +0000

I think that the Forbes ranking might heavily penalize schools like Hopkins, Chicago, Caltech, and Georgia Tech that have reputations for being incredibly rigorous. I think that a lot of what Forbes is trying to do is pick the schools that the students are the “happiest” with. I think that objectively those schools offer phenomenal educations and I know people who have graduated from those institutions and gone on to lead incredibly successful lives, but I also know of people who have gone to those schools and were very unhappy with the competition and high-stress lifestyle of the schools as well.

I don’t necessarily think that’s a fair criticism of those schools for a ranking, but I think it’s something students should take into consideration. Someone prone to testing anxiety probably shouldn’t go to a top state-school engineering program like GT, and someone who wants to only go to parties and take easy classes shouldn’t go to Caltech. It also could be why Harvey Mudd (despite being one of the best LACs and engineering schools in general) was hammered in the LAC rankings.