<p>Consider that there is no scientific basis for what factors USNWR uses, how they are weighted, and no test of reproducibility. In fact, of course, there is absolutely no agreed upon definition of what makes a college “best”. It is absurd on its face. But in any case, to tie my comment to the reaction of nothingto, since there is no way to know if the formula USNWR came up with was correct, the originator himself, in an interview, said that he adjusted the formula until it ranked the top schools, as he perceived them, at the top. I am obviously paraphrasing what he said, it was quite a long time ago when I read the interview. But it made me laugh and I distinctly remember the gist of what he said, because it was so absurd. I couldn’t believe that he actually admitted that he derived a formula to “prove” what he “knew” to be right.</p>
<p>People waste so much time and money and sometimes make very poor decisions based on this USNWR travesty, it is almost criminal (not literally of course). Trying to measure the unmeasureable, what a joke. But genius for making a lot of money once a year, not to mention getting your publication’s name mentioned over and over and over.</p>
<p>BTW nothingto, if you go to the USNWR web page where they talk about the rankings, they list their methodology. Try doing some research and you will see the peer review was 25% last year, and has been for a while. Also, before you get upset, of course HYP are great schools in most areas. That isn’t the point. The point is that tweaking a formula so they come out on top doesn’t make the formula “right”. Mathematically and scientifically, there are lots of incorrect formulae and theories that still match some of the empirical data. And that’s for things that can be measured. This is subjective nonsense.</p>
<p>^ I am not upset. Rather baffled. But thanks, for telling me about the peer review though, never knew about that. But, rather I never said US NEWS was infallible, rather I just said that US NEWS is the best, mostly out of all the others. But then complaining why HYP are always on top is ridiculous. Of course they are going to be on top. Until another school beats it basically. Which isn’t the case, or at least it isn’t happening yet.</p>
<p>Apology accepted. Why did you sound so excited when someone mentioned that Caltech was 1st for one of the years? Do you have some relation with Caltech?</p>
<p>Uhuh. That’s better. Harvard is one of the many great colleges in America. Now some argue its the best, but I personally see no point in doing that. Its nothing but an ego boost.
To me, once you hit a certain level of achievement, prestige, research, academics, etc, I see them the same.
And its very true. </p>
<p>I understand some of you may not believe in me. I was like that too, thinking I was a bigshot in getting into/studying at Duke, the south’s trump card university and turning down Yale, (*gasp its Yaleee). I thought I was a more bigger badass for getting into MIT, the “engineer’s haven.”</p>
<p>But really…it doesn’t matter anymore. Maybe it hits you through life experiences, girlfriend trouble, just life in general. You realize HYP is just another thing out there in the world. Its meaningless to make a distinction between Harvard and Cornell.</p>
Actually, to the even more enlightened, everything is the same. I’m not enlightened as much though. If I were, I wouldn’t be at CC. My ego wouldn’t be twice the size of the Duke forest. :p</p>
<p>What do you mean how I would know and defined by who. It’s basic knowledge that if something is left un-beaten, it’s still at the top. There are few that actually beat HYP.</p>
OK, sorry I didn’t realize I had to spell it out in more basic terms. In baseball, football, etc. you look at the scoreboard at the end of the game and you know who won and who lost. You look at the standings at the end of the season and you know who was best, 2nd best, etc. In this case, what are you going to look at to say HYP is still best? You cannot say the USNWR rankings, that is what is called circular reasoning. The point is there is no objective standard to make such a determination, there is only subjective rankings. Saying “I know my ranking system works because the schools everyone knows are best come out on top” fails on about 6 different levels of scientific and other reasoning/logic tests.</p>
<p>To try and make an example for you, defend for me that having 25% of the ranking be peer review. Prove to me this is ABSOLUTELY the correct parameter, and that the data provided (the questionaire used to gather the data) is correctly structured and unbiased. Further, prove to me that using admission % (number of students offered admittance divided by the number that apply) should be used as a parameter at all. After all, a school can not push for applications one year, get 10,000 and admit 4,000 for a 40% rate, then the next year send out free apps, get 40,000 apps, admit 8,000 and lower their rate to 20%. Before you protest this is silly, it has been done by a number of schools. Not so much to improve their USNWR ranking (after all this parameter is only 1.5%), but it still happens and it still has an impact. So you would argue that the school is suddenly a better school? Similarly, they used to have yield (the % of those 4,000 or 8,000 accepted that actually enroll) as a parameter, now they don’t, but they are thinking of putting it back. Yeah, that provides a lot of confidence in the methodology.</p>
<p>I am not saying that you are supporting USNWR rankings and the methods per se. I don’t know if you are or not, although you said you thought it was “best”. What I am saying is that you cannot logically use the fact that it always comes out with HYP in the top 5 as proof that it is best.</p>
Due to increasing importance of STEM majors in the global economy, USNWR decided to give a bonus to schools with great math, science and engineering programs. This was determined by a combination of NAE/NAS members on the faculty and USNWR undergraduate engineering ranking. :P</p>