For the past couple of years, Frank Bruni has been peddling this notion that college rankings don’t matter at all. It helps sell his book. It also comforts nervous students and parents. But… Frank Bruni himself is a graduate of UNC Chapel Hill and Columbia. Others on CC have also posted summaries of the educational credentials of the NYT, which are overwhelmingly “elite.” There is a heavy dose of hypocrisy in anything that Frank Bruni and the NYT write on this subject. BTW, don’t most universities essentially rank applicants? None that I know of admit students by pulling names out of a hat, irrespective of SAT/ACT scores, GPA, HS course rigor, etc.