Gourman Report - How reliable?

collegehelp
Thu, 15 Jun 2006 06:44:26 +0000

If I had to put a number on it, I would say it is 90% reliable.

The Gourman Report is reliable enough to use as a starting point in your college search but it has limitations. It is not the ultimate authority. You should always research colleges from any list in depth. The Gourman Report uses an explicit set of criteria that favors larger universities. Consequently, the Gourman Report underestimates (overlooks) Liberal Arts Colleges. The Gourman Report would be more reliable if the data were updated. The data is at least ten years old, but the quality of academic departments generally doesn’t change very quickly. There are some curious omissions from some lists and some curious inclusions in others.

Here is something I posted in another thread:
"I can understand your discomfort with 10-year-old information. But, after studying the Gourman rankings from different angles in different disciplines, I am convinced the rankings are still accurate. I have concluded that departmental quality almost always changes very slowly.

Let me try to persuade you:
(1) The Gourman physics ranking is consistent with current information. The average difference (absolute value) between the Gourman Ranking for Physics and the 2007 US News ranking for graduate programs in physics is only 4.2 positions based on 30 schools. (US News considers the quality of graduate programs an indicator of undergraduate quality at large universities.) The average difference would be much less if it weren’t for two schools with large disagreements. Sixteen out of thirty schools were ranked within three positions of each other. The correlation between the 1997 Gourman undergraduate ranking for physics and the 2007 US News graduate ranking for physics is .80 (very high).

(2) Rankings for physics change very little in ten years. The correlation between the 1997 US News graduate rankings for physics and the 2007 US News graduate rankings for physics was .96 (almost perfect). The average difference between the 1997 US News grad physics ranking and 2007’s is 1.5 positions (absolute value). If very slow change is true for graduate programs which are more subject to change than undergrad, it is certainly more true for undergraduate.

(3) Rankings in other undergraduate disciplines change very little. The correlation between the 1997 US News undergrad ENGINEERING ranking and 2006 is .95 (almost perfect). The average change in US News rank for undergrad engineering 1997 to 2006 was 2.3 positions (absolute value). For undergrad BUSINESS, the US News 1997 ranking with 2006 ranking correlation was .94 (almost perfect). The average change in 1997 versus 2006 business rank was 3.5 postions (absolute value).

For readers who don’t know what “absolute value” means, it is the average ignoring minus signs so a +1 and a -1 difference don’t cancel each other out.

Rankings change negligibly over a ten year period. The Gourman Report is still accurate.

The Gourman Report targeted data relevant to undergraduate education. It is the only ranking available for many undergraduate disciplines. It would be irrational to discount the Gourman Report."