Reminder, once again, CC is not a debate society. This thread is NOT in the cafe or the political forum. Take the back and forth to PM or use one of the existing threads about ROI.
2 Likes
Among college rankings, USNWR has the most market share by large margin. Nobody else even comes close as a notable competitor. When a poster in this forum talks about a T10 or T20 college, they are referring to USNWR ranking of that college – not Time Magazine ranking.
The idea of determining the “best college” for a particular student by a formula that is 20% admin “marginal”/“distinguished” survey, 8% financial resources per student, 8% faculty salary, 5% earnings per major, … is ridiculous. This obviously won’t actually determine anything resembling “best college”. Instead what gives college rankings value is how people react to those rankings, and some people do indeed react to USNWR rankings. If a college moves up/down in the rankings to T##, there is often a large change in number of applications and desirability, alumni reaction/donation, financing balances, … which can make the rankings something of a self fulfilling prophecy. A large change in USNWR can have a notable effect on the actual future success of the college. It can also lead to colleges cheating/gaming USNWR ranking, as has been discussed earlier in the thread.
In order for USNWR to retain its dominant hold on college rankings, USNWR need to keep a sufficient number of people believing in the rankings. The top 5 ranked colleges are HYPSM (actual order is PMHSY). That looks right to readers and supports USNWR’s need for a sufficient number of people to believe in their rankings. Dramatically shaking things or “needs a new splash” goes against this effect. It’s fine to have minor changes like change the order of PMHSY a bit from year to year. It’s not fine for GeorgiaTech to be ranked as 16th or CMU to break in to top 10. That looks wrong to viewers, and makes fewer persons believe in the rankings.
Time Magazine or other college rankings are in a completely different position. They need to give readers a reason to buy/click/read their rankings instead of just going with USNWR college rank. As such, it’s important to show that their rankings are completely different from USNWR, and USNWR cannot substitute. For Time Magazine or similar, it’s important to have a very different formula from USNWR and some major differences in ranking order from USNWR that viewers notice. For example, the top 5 in the Time Magazine ranking are:
- Stanford
- MIT
- Harvey Mudd
- Princeton
- Michigan
Stanford, MIT, and Princeton are what viewers expect to see, giving viewers some confidence that the Time Magazine rankings are meaningful. However, the Time rankings also include some major deviances from USNWR including Michigan ranked as #5. This gives readers a reason click/buy/view the Time Magazine rankings and see more. That’s a good decision for Time Magazine, but would be a horrible decision for USNWR’s success/revenue.
4 Likes
I remember reading somewhere (probably in Jeff Selingo’s book) that USNWR does, in fact, follow this tactic: don’t upset the top of the list, but shake things up lower down the list so they can continue to keep consumers engaged.
4 Likes
But USNWR didn’t invent this.
Nobody argues with People magazine (or its ilk) that George Clooney is the sexiest man in the world (or whoever gets crowned that year). He may not be to your taste; you may prefer the Brad Pitt or Tom Cruise type/look. But with GC at the top, and his clones in the top 5, the editors have license to shake things up further down. And then they watch Reddit explode with “how could you possible leave off X” or “Your editors need bifocals” and clicks and engagements zoom higher with every link, whether supportive or negative.
Nobody starts with Jason Alexander as number 1. That doesn’t drive engagement.
I would argue that would generate even stronger reactions and more clicks and comments 
7 Likes
Personally I agree with you. But the gods of social media have decreed that there needs to be an anchor or tent pole first!
I find it funny when people get so angry when a new ranking comes out and doesn’t look like US News or traditional expectations. A common refrain is “Any ranking that would put X above Y is trash. Nobody has even heard of X.” Every ranking is flawed because it’s impossible to get something like “best school” from a finite set of metrics. Some feel that career success should be favored, others only care how hard the school is to get into. It’s worth looking at the ranking methodology to see which you may think are best for the reason you are looking.
The best thing about LinkedIn, Times, Forbes, WSJ, Niche, etc. creating rankings is that it gives more data points to look at. If a school is ranked highly in a couple of them but lower in USN, maybe it gives a reason to look at that school to see if the reason it does well in the other rankings fits with what you are looking for.
4 Likes
Yes, since I think generic rankings are silly, I might prefer a world with none. But I would also prefer a world with ten to a world with one.
4 Likes
You are giving them way too much credit. The below doesn’t even include Time Magazine joining the fold this season and the impact that is going to have.
"Among the 58% of students who use rankings, the breakdown of publication “market share” is as follows: [1]
- U.S. News & World Report: 22% share. While still the dominant industry leader, its reader share has declined from 27% in previous years as students pivot toward diverse digital sources. [1]
- All Other Publications Combined: 36% share. This remaining market share is fragmented across alternative major ranking platforms, which include:
- Niche: Highly popular for its heavy emphasis on student life, campus safety, and user-generated reviews.
- Forbes: Positioned as the premier post-graduate outcomes ranker, focusing on alumni salaries, student debt, and overall return on investment.
- The Wall Street Journal / Times Higher Education (WSJ/THE): Heavily utilized by students prioritizing institutional resources, academic reputation, and salary impact.
- Washington Monthly: A rapidly growing alternative list focused heavily on social mobility and community service tracking. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
- No Rankings Used: 42% of students report that they do not look at or consider any college ranking publications when deciding where to go to school"
Everything you said is exactly why US News needs to change for credibility . You think you are the only one to figure out their schtick? The thing use said about market share is why they are changing. They know it’s going down. You will be surprised in a few weeks.
In his white undies and hairy back posing - for the dude at the photo store.
Who wouldn’t want that hunk of a man!!!??
1 Like
And some of them use actual data - like on the US News Academic Departments - it’s a popularity contests amongst academics who simply rate the same schools over and over again - hence the department rankings rarely change.
Someone is sending their kid to a school because - academics said it’s best.
OK - is it best for preparing your kid for a role? For helping them find a job? Not part of the equation.
But we see it on international and domestic - my budget is $30K but i’m going to apply to those $80K+ out of state schools - that are $80K because of their ranking - and people are falling over themselves to get into - only to find out it’s only the super wealthy can afford them…all because US News put them on a list.
Getting people to buy into the first 5 or 6 entries is indeed integral to gaining acceptance of the basic premise of a ranking as I recently found out in creating a list of National LACs. It wasn’t even a ranking in the true sense of the word since they were all listed alphabetically. But once they read Amherst, Bates, Bowdoin, Bryn Mawr, CMC and Colby - people were all in:
2 Likes
But where was Allegheny, ahead of Amherst, if alphabetical? Not a sexy name.
Too late. The edit function closes after 24 hours. In any event, the premise was that there was such a thing as a “national” LAC and no one questioned it after the first few hours the thread was up.
Oh, it was a list here. That’s like SLAC. Some say selective - others small.
If you say selective, what’s the cutoff.
But yeah, lots of LACs - and public LACs.
My daughters was deemed a public LAC. Is it - I don’t know. But it’s 9K kids. Is Bucknell an LAC?
It’s too hard to categorize - hence the one size fits all is better (in my opinion) - or maybe a rank by size vs. classification - but only US News seems to use the goofy classifications. I mean, you have Regional Universities North and Regional Colleges North. It’s just weird.
I’m not sure what it is you’re asking?
It is. What’s interesting is that you’re the first person in well over 3 days to raise the possibility. Getting back to @DadOfJerseyGirl 's point, certain schools come immediately to mind and it’s important that they be the tent pole for the ranking, list, etc.
1 Like
It looks like you cut and pasted another AI response. The AI is basing this “market share” on a single survey asking high school seniors which college rankings they have used. USNWR had the highest portion used, but many seniors said they also used other rankings besides just USNWR. Niche was 2nd highest. This might include things like students reporting having looked at Niche’s ranking of Best College Food, Top Party Schools, etc.
It’s not just a matter of which rankings college students have used. It’s also a matter of influence. While a significant minority of students may look at Niche rankings as part of their college search, I’ve never seen anyone refer to a T## college as their Niche ranking. Or heard of a college cheating/gaming their Niche ranking. Or heard of alumni withholding donations because the college’s Niche rankings dropped. Yet I’ve heard all of the above for USNWR ranking many times.
USNWR makes tens of millions per year from their rankings, perhaps excess of $100 million. USNWR charges colleges tens of thousands of $ for the license to market their ranking. It’s often $10k just to display the USNWR badge. USNWR receives over 100 million visitors per year to it’s ranking section, which has ad generating revenue. USNWR charges students $60 to unlock the rankings, and countless students pay it.
In contrast Niche rankings are free and seemingly without ads. Niche does earn plenty of revenue from colleges, but through other portions of their website that many students use. College rankings seem more like a secondary side article on their website, rather than the main event.
2 Likes
Why is it with robust engineering and not a major but a school of management ? It’s ba k to what is an LAC ? Why is it an LAV - because they say so or Us news says so ? In that sense, other than size, how is it different than - Slippery Rock or Lehigh ?