<p>Techie, you’re right.</p>
<h1>PhD Programs with Upper Range Including #1:</h1>
<p>Harvard - 19
Berkeley - 16
Stanford - 11
Columbia - 7
MIT- 7
Michigan - 7
Princeton - 7
Yale - 7
Wisconsin - 6
Cornell - 4
Penn - 4
UCLA - 3
UT-Austin - 3
UIUC - 2
UMN-TC - 1
UNC - 1
UF - 1
UMD - 1
UVA - 1</p>
<p>
Those concentrations are for undergrad. I think a program encompasses all sub-disciplines taught that lead to a PhD in ____________________.</p>
<p>Maybe I’m wrong but no one seems to get a PhD in microeconomics.</p>
<p>I used to think the NRC rankings were the “gold standard,” but recently I’ve discovered that the new ones are still fraught with errors (even with their ‘revisions’) and largely disregarded in the academic community. For the first time ever, people in academia look at US News rankings more favorably than the NRC ones.</p>
<p>Perhaps in the next NRC survey, the methodology won’t be absurdly complex and they’ll stick to numbers that they can actually manage. In the meantime, they’re largely useless (esp. since we can never tell whether what we’re reading is based on correct data).</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Is there a direct link to these lists? And aren’t Columbia, Princeton, and MIT missing from the top-10 list?</p>
<p>^ And also Yale (missing from the top-10 list)?</p>
<p>45, I compiled the list from the info I had from the Berkeley report and barrons posts. Feel free to add others. CIT is also missing.</p>
<p>
It’s sad that it took the NRC years to develop a “right” methodology but academics don’t like the results. I wonder if NRC goes back to the drawing board? </p>
<p>
I believe the original NRC rankings used mostly peer assessment as a methodology, which is current USNWR methodology for most grad programs. Perhaps academics just like peer assessment. ;)</p>
<p>We need that guy from Texas A&M to make some sense of these like he did back in the 90s (if he’s still around):</p>
<p>[NRC</a> Rankings in Each of 41 Areas](<a href=“http://www.stat.tamu.edu/~jnewton/nrc_rankings/nrc41.html]NRC”>NRC Rankings in Each of 41 Areas)</p>
<p>:)</p>
<p>Both R and S are weighted measures.</p>
<p>The S measure is more of a scholarly measure per capita.
The R measure is more related to the size of the program and S more to the quality of the program although there is a lot of overlap. </p>
<p>The S measure has the the following top weights:
<p>The R measure has the following top weights:
<p>Large publics tend to do better in the R measure than S measure. Large privates will be about even and small privates may have better S scores than R scores.</p>
<p>Berkeley for instance had 15 top R scores versus 6 top S scores. (excluding agricultural sciences).
Harvard had 19 top R scores and 18 Top S scores.
Caltech has 6 top R scores and 9 top S scores.</p>
<p>There seems to be a lot of ways to rig the results, especially as Sakky has identified by creating multiple programs in a particular field. This is particularly the case in the sciences where the boundaries are often ill defined unlike say engineering. </p>
<p>Berkeley seems to have mastered that art especially well.</p>
<p>As an example comparing MIT and Berkeley in the broad field of Biological and Health Sciences.
MIT has five total programs in five fields:
S scores:4 #1 and 1#5
R scores: 4 # 1 and 1 #2 </p>
<p>Berkeley , in the same broad field has 15 programs spread across 8 fields:
S scores: 1 #1, 2 #2, 3#3
R scores: 3#1, 5#2, 1#3</p>
<p>In the broad field of Biological & Health Sciences and Sub-field of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Structural Biology, Berkeley has 3 entries as compared to MIT’s single program. MIT’s program is ranked (1,1) while Berkeley’s programs are ranked (1,2), (2,2) and (11,7). Some of Berkeley’s programs exist nowhere else such as Comparative Biochemistry! </p>
<p>By splicing and dicing, Berkeley has created programs which may no longer be statistically significant. More than half of Berkeley’s programs in biology/health sciences graduate less than 5 PhDs annually (8 out of 15), some less than 2! This compares to zero programs with less than 5 PhDs/year at MIT. </p>
<p>Number of ranked programs is therefore a pretty meaningless statistic. You really need to dig deep into the data to get any useful comparative data among institutions. Who cares if an institution has X number of highly ranked programs if they are in obscure or phantom fields with no comps!</p>
<p>Here is the complete list of all the UCB programs actually ranked–others are subfields but don’t get a final ranking in the big summary document. I don’t see many "subfields are off the wall majors listed. Is it a little infair for a smaller field to count as much as a large one like History, English or Poli Sci. Maybe but UCB does well in all the popular areas too.</p>
<p>Plant Biology
Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Genetics, Genomics and Development
Epidemiology
Civil and Environmental Engineering
Mechanical Engineering
English
German
History of Art
Astrophysics
Chemistry
Computer Science
Mathematics
Physics
Agricultural and Resource Economics
Political Science
Biophysics
Environmental Science, Policy and Management
Integrative Biology
Immunology
Microbiology
Classics
Comparative Literature
Philosophy
Earth and Planetary Science
Statistics
Linguistics
Sociology
Cell and Developmental Biology
Chemical Engineering
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Industrial Engineering and Operations Research
Hispanic Languages and Literatures
Performance Studies
Anthropology
Economics
Geography
Molecular and Biochemical Nutrition
Ancient History and Mediterranean Archaeology
History
Neuroscience
Materials Science and Engineering
French
Infectious Diseases and Immunity
Music
Health Services and Policy Analysis</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>And last time I checked, nobody (at least from Berkeley) seems to get a PhD in “MCB:Immunology” or “MCB:Cell/Developmental Biology” either. They all just get a PhD in MCB. So why are they counted as separate “programs” for the purposes of the NRC? </p>
<p>If MCB can count its myriad undergrad concentrations as separate “programs”, then I don’t see why every other major can’t do the same.</p>
<p>@barrons</p>
<p>You actually forgot 4 areas for Berkeley in the latest revision:
-Comparative Biochemistry
-Biostatistics
-Environmental Health Sciences
-Psychology</p>
<p>Total programs ranked are 50.</p>
<p>^ Hey there’s “comaparative literature”, why not “comparative biochemistry”? :)</p>
<p>Sakky, I don’t know the answer to your question, but perhaps with the deeper specialization in medical and biological sciences, these are recognized by the NRC. </p>
<p>It’s not like Berkeley is making up programs that other schools can’t offer.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>The real problem is that Berkeley seems to be making up obscure programs with hardly any grad student simply to get more rankings.</p>
<p>I only included those programs ranked in the top 10 as that was the stat we were looking at.
Cellardweller–I think you claim is unfounded and ridiculous.</p>
<p>But there is even a journal for Comparative Biochemistry.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/525464/description#description[/url]”>http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/525464/description#description</a></p>
<p>Here’s a list of Harvard’s Top 10 programs. Some pretty obscure health stuff in there too.</p>
<p>DMS-Biological and Biomedical Sciences
DMS-Virology
DMS-Neuroscience
SPH Epidemiology
SPH Occupational Health
Hist. of American Civ.
Classics
English & American Lit. & Lang.
History
Chemical Physics
Chemistry
Earth & Planetary Sciences
Physics
Anthropology
Economics
Government
Psychology
Social Policy
Sociology
Molecular and Cellular Biology
Organismic and Evolutionary Biology
DMS-Immunology
DEAS-Engineering Sciences
Comparative Literature
Germanic Lang. & Lit.
Music
DEAS-Applied Physics
Statistics
Business Economics
Biophysics
SPH Nutrition
History of Art and Architecture
Astronomy
Mathematics
Organizational Behavior
Health Policy
The Study of Religion
SPH Society Human Development and Health
Political Economy & Gov.
KSG Public Policy
SPH Exposure Epidemiology and Risk
SPH Health Policy and Management
Romance Languages and Literature
DEAS-Applied Mathematics
Linguistics
Biological Science and Public Health
DEAS-Computer Sciences</p>
<p>A better quality comparator would be an average based ranking such as was part of the prior NRC ranking. It does not make sens to compare universities with 65+ programs such as Michigan with universities with 24 programs such as CalTech on an absolute basis.</p>
<p>If you rank universities by percentage of programs with and R or S score in the the top 5 you get:</p>
<ol>
<li>MIT 96.3% (26/27)</li>
<li>Harvard 88.5% (46/52)</li>
<li>Caltech 87.55 (21/24)</li>
<li>Berkeley 84% (42/50)</li>
<li>Stanford 83% (39/47)</li>
<li>Princeton 82.9% (29/35)</li>
<li>Yale 59.2% (29/49)</li>
<li>Columbia 48.9% (23/47)</li>
<li>Michigan 47.7% (31/65)</li>
<li>Penn 39% (16/41)</li>
<li>Cornell 34.4% (40/61)</li>
</ol>
<p>Only 7 schools have a majority of their programs ranked among the top 5 through either through the S or R rankings. There is a big drop after Princeton and another big drop after Michigan.</p>
<p>^ Fair enough.</p>
<p>I believe there are narrower focus but deep universities like MIT and Caltech and there are broad focus and deep universities like Harvard, Stanford and Berkeley.</p>
<ol>
<li>MIT 96.3% (26/27)</li>
<li>Harvard 88.5% (46/52)</li>
<li>Caltech 87.55 (21/24)</li>
<li>Berkeley 84% (42/50)</li>
<li>Stanford 83% (39/47)</li>
<li>Princeton 82.9% (29/35)</li>
<li>Yale 59.2% (29/49)</li>
<li>Columbia 48.9% (23/47)</li>
<li>Michigan 47.7% (31/65)</li>
<li>Penn 39% (16/41)</li>
<li>Cornell 34.4% (40/61)</li>
</ol>
<p>I have no problems with this ranking list. These schools truly are the top universities in this country. It also shows that Michigan and Cornell are the most comprehensive of the top schools.</p>
<p>@barrons</p>
<p>Comparative biochemistry is not recognized as a distinct discipline. It is a hodgepodge of pretty much everything you want.</p>
<p>Even Berkeley defines it as an “interdisciplinary graduate group”.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Total number of universities outside of Berkeley with a program in Comparative Biochemistry: zero.</p>
<p>I don’t understand. have they never heard of university of chicago?</p>