<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=228347[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=228347</a></p>
<p>Dude peer score sucks…use the overall US News ranking score (out of a 100) and you’ll see how close these schools really are. But don’t use the peer review score. ThePrestige’s ranking is best IMO. </p>
<p>If you would take Columbia over Harvard anyday, good for you, most high schoolers wouldn’t because Harvard is better than Columbia in almost every way relevant to a high schooler deciding what school is better.</p>
<p>FYI…here is a rank list of USNWR’s peer score with National Universities & LACs combined…top 44 institutions (thru peer score 4.1)</p>
<p>Peer score ranking
Rank/School/Score
- Harvard 4.9
- MIT 4.9
- Princeton 4.9
- Stanford 4.9
- Yale 4.9
- Amherst 4.7
- Cal Berkeley 4.7
- Cal Tech 4.7
- Chicago 4.7
- Williams 4.7
- Columbia 4.6
- Cornell 4.6
- JHU 4.6
- Swarthmore 4.6
- Duke 4.5
- Michigan 4.5
- Penn 4.5
- Wellesley 4.5
- Brown 4.4
- Dartmouth 4.4
- Northwestern 4.4
- Carleton 4.4
- Bowdoin 4.3
- Middlebury 4.3
- Pomona 4.3
- Smith 4.3
- UCLA 4.3
- Virginia 4.3
- Wesleyan 4.3
- Bryn Mawr 4.2
- Carnegie Mellon 4.2
- Grinnell 4.2
- Haverford 4.2
- Oberlin 4.2
- UNC 4.2
- Wisconsin 4.2
- Davidson 4.1
- Georgetown 4.1
- Harvey Mudd 4.1
- Rice 4.1
- Texas 4.1
- Vanderbilt 4.1
- Vassar 4.1
- Washington USTL 4.1</p>
<p>“If you would take Columbia over Harvard anyday, good for you, most high schoolers wouldn’t because Harvard is better than Columbia in almost every way relevant to a high schooler deciding what school is better.”</p>
<p>That could be said about any school facing Harvard!</p>
<p>In terms of pure academics, I’d have to say that the USNWR peer assesment scores are generally pretty telling. The Fiske Guide is also excellent.</p>
<p>What does “pure academics” mean?</p>
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<p>Actually several schools are quite better than Harvard for engineering and that’s just one major example. No one can deny that Harvard is the most prestigious university in the country, but whether Harvard is the “best” university in the country can be debated. Most knowledgeable people would argue that Harvard isn’t as good as other schools for undergraduate education.</p>
<p>the LAC and university peer scores measure different things, and cannot be combined in this way.</p>
<p>On the other hand, the peer score, when comparing universities to universities or LAC’s to LAC’s at least does not suffer from USNews’ arbitrary reweighting the factors each year.</p>
<p>Where can I find this ‘peer score’ sorting of the LAC’s and Universities?</p>
<p>princeton review changes its criteria for “academic ranking” each year. Schools that are not on the list one year are suddenly #1 the next year. It is by far the LEAST ACCURATE list.</p>
<p>By pure academics I mean quality of faculty, quality of academic departments and breadth and depth of curriculae.</p>
<p>Except how do measure quality of faculty and quality of academic departments? It’s completely nebulous and subjective. Not to mention that I imagine in many cases the people filling out these surveys don’t have close to an accurate understanding of these parameters at many peer institutions. Do you really think that whoever fills out this survey at Bowdoin really has any idea of the difference in quality of faculty (or is attempting to figure out a way to accurately measure it) between Washington & Lee, Davidson and Carleton?</p>
<p>I’ll leave it to the experts. Those who have spent, quite literally, hundreds of thousands of hours in academe. You may thing they are ignorant, but I personally think they know more than I do.</p>
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<p>Why exclude bachelor’s and master’s colleges? Some of those USN&WR scores 4.1 and over:</p>
<p>(For comparison, Darthmouth, Brown, Northwestern and Carleton are 4.4)</p>
<p>Harvey Mudd 4.4 (you had Mudd at 4.1, the 2007 score is 4.4)
Rose-Hulman 4.4
Berea 4.3
Villanova 4.3
Trinity 4.2
Creighton 4.1
Stonehill 4.1
Calvin 4.1</p>
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<p>Alexandre, I don’t think that anyone is questioning the level of intelligence (or resumes) of those who vote for the peer score.</p>
<p>I think a relevant analogy is the NCAA Football Coach’s poll for the BCS Championship. Each coach puts in their vote, and this poll is a critical part of the BCS rankings (it isn’t the entire BCS ranking, but it is a critical component, much like the peer score is a critical component in the USNWR ranking).</p>
<p>Now, there is an inherent bias in this poll. Coach’s have their own agendas when they vote (whether it be to boost their own strength of schedules or boost their own conference members). That is why the OSU Football coach declined to vote in the past Coach’s poll because he felt there was a direct “conflict of interest” (i.e. voting between Michigan vs. Florida). Further, one of the other criticisms of this poll is that no active D1-A head coach is going to find the time to watch and analyze every Top 25 team in the country –> in point of fact, they are rarely looking at anything but film on the upcoming opponent (e.g. Michigan’s coach declined to comment on Florida’s team because he just “hasn’t seem them play”) –> and yet, these Coach’s are asked to rank the Top 25 every week.</p>
<p>The point? No one will argue that these Coach’s understand the game inside and out, better than the average person will ever understand. Hundreds of hours of experience and film. But so what? That doesn’t mean that these Coach’s won’t be affected by personal / professional bias –> they are rational people and will vote in a manner that best benefits them. Period.</p>
<p>So in much the same way, the folks who vote in the peer score will vote with their own personal bias. They can have a resume a mile long, but that doesn’t give me any comfort on why their opinions matter on the relative merits of a Dartmouth vs. a University of Wisconsin.</p>
<p>Comparing sports to academics is a very dangerous game. College football changes day to day. Injuries, suspensions, graduation of players etc… Academic departments take 20 years or more to change. Secondly, college football breeds a very different type of loyalty than academe. The comparison doesn’t work. In all of my experience, over 10 years of serious study on the subject of college ratings, nothing comes close to the USNWR peer assessment score. Fiske also very good.</p>
<p>Yes, they are different.</p>
<p>But the inherent bias embedded in such “polls” (be it the BCS Ranking or Peer Score Ranking) doesn’t change (regardless if one is looking at a vastly changing landscape or a static one) –> each person will vote in a manner that best benefits them.</p>
<p>That is true, biases do exist. The PA is determined by human beings afterall. But I’d say the biases cancel each other out and in the end, you have a pretty good overall academic ranking. Andof course, the scores aren’t 100% accurate either. It’s not like a university with a PA score of 4.4 is worse than a university with a PA score of 4.5. Withing 2-3/10th of a point, I’d say universities are of equal academic quality.</p>
<p>In end end, biases cannot change the bottom line. Even in college football polls, where biases are much stronger, and changes far more frequent and drastic, the rankings aren’t usually too far from reality. Ohio State is #1, Florida is #2, Michigan is #3, LSU is #4, USC is #5, Wisconsin is #6 etc… No matter how you look at it, those 6 teams are all top 10 teams, regardless of bias.</p>
<p>Well, I don’t want to get sidetracked here discussing College Football, but in a system where one single position is the difference between playing for the Championship or going to a BCS Bowl, getting 6 out of the top 10 teams isn’t good enough. </p>
<p>You as a Michigan alum have every right to be upset that the Wolverines didn’t get a shot at the Championship. If Michigan’s close loss to the Buckeyes came at the beginning of the season and if the Big 10 didn’t end their season earlier than the other conferences (i.e. where other teams and conferences had an opportunity to showcase their talent to keep them fresh in the minds of press/media) –> Michigan would be in the title game. But as it happened, Michigan goes to the Rose Bowl.</p>
<p>People (i.e. coaches) didn’t want to see a back-to-back OSU-Mich rematch. Period. Even though Michigan is probably the 2nd best team in the country. Now tell me that personal bias didn’t play a huge factor in that outcome. As a Mich alum you are likely to understand this better than most.</p>
<p>Obviously, I feel that Michigan deserved a shot at the title game, but it’s not what the majority of the pollsters wanted. My personal sentiments aside, the point I am making is that there isn’t an appreciable difference in quality between #2 and #3. Or between #2 and #6 for that matter. So yes, there are regional baises in college football, and I agree that there are some biases in academic ratings too. I never said there was a perfect system. All I said is that the PA is the closest thing we have to an accurate rating of academics and even with all the biases, the end result is never far away from the truth, whether we are talking about college football rankings or academic ratings.</p>