Forbes Best Colleges 2015

bclintonk
Wed, 12 Aug 2015 20:47:24 +0000

bluewater2015:

I think in particular that one rank ordering including LACs and research universities is an apples to oranges comparison. Certainly some will find Pomona and Williams to be better for their needs than Stanford, Princeton, Yale and Harvard (as the rank ordering would indicate), but it’s ranking two very different kinds of institutions.

I don’t disagree with this, but US News is equally arbitrary in dividing all the top schools into only 2 kinds, “national universities” (their own label, most would say “research universities”) and LACs. Applying the same logic, one could just as easily say that some will find Yale or Chicago to be better for their needs than MIT or Caltech (as the rank ordering would indicate), but it’s ranking two very different kinds of institutions. A classics or art history major would be poorly served at MIT or Caltech, neither of which offers a major in either of those disciplines, but an engineering major would be equally poorly served at Chicago which doesn’t offer engineering, and arguably better served at MIT or Caltech than at Yale which offers engineering, but with a program that is not nearly so highly regarded as MIT’s or Caltech’s.