I could ask this ? on a regular forum, but the list might be different for athletic recruits. Is Forbes better than Princeton or USWNR if student is not going to grad school?
There was a thread on this forum a month back about students who chose lower ranked schools just to be able to play sports. However, if an athletic recruit is just an average college student (A-/B+ in college prep with a few Honors/APs, medium test scores), the student may only be able to get in B level schools without athletics anyway. My son had some serious interest from two top 100 schools but one was not affordable, and I think he will be edged out by another recruit for the last spot for another top 100.
My daughter who lettered in two sports in HS but did not play college sports ended up going to a school ranked in the #500s by Forbes even though she got in one top 100 school; the top 100 school did not have her major, and the #500 school had a small new program in her field with only 50 Honors students a year started with faculty who previously worked at a prestigious D3 university.School was well known in health and sciences, not so much for other majors. Daughter graduated with high honors in STEM double major and went straight from college into PhD program in her field-stipend to cover school and living expenses.She is glad of the choice she made. Forbes only ranks 600-700 schools out of what 3000 4 year colleges in US? Does that mean any college on their list is OK? Son’s remaining athletic choices are #400s-600s on Forbes. Some of them are former state regional colleges that over the last 5-10 years have invested in facilities, dorms, faculty, etc to become research universities with graduate programs too. Many states are turning additional state universities into high tier research universities as their 1-2 flagship universities now have 50% or less admissions rates; to get those schools, students need high grades, extracurriculars, high test scores, and at least 5 APs. In my state, there are two flagships, neither of which my son could get in without athletics and he does not have the athletics level either. However there are 3 other public D1 universities that are now considered research universities. My son’s high school is one of the top in the state, and most kids used to go to the two flagships or high ranked schools out of state. Now there are a significant number of kids who go to the three other universities, and they have Honors programs too. Those schools are all in the same Forbes range of 400s-600s.
How important is balance? If a recruit goes to a B level school and plays midmajor sports, maybe the student also has some time for a social life. When I look at review of these B level academic midmajor schools, there are students that love them, and those that dont. Most reviews are 4s or 1/2s. Actually on the student review sites, most schools I looked at received 4 out of 5 but the few negative reviews were a concern. For OOS schools, I have contacted people I know in those states and found out the coaches and schools have a generably favorable review. Where we live, many parents and students are snooty about schools, and they apply to 15+ reach schools. However, I have seen how well my daughter did at a school many of her classmates would have looked down on, so I want to be open-minded but it is hard to know which reviews to trust especially for out of state schools.My son is not a LAC candidate; he does not want to get to know his professors. He wants to get his schoolwork done and graduate while playing the sport he loves. He is not one who studies for the love of learning. I went to a selective private LAC/regional university where professors once a month ate dinner with students and discussed current issues; I loved that but my son could care less.
Didn’t you see by your daughter’s experience that rankings don’t really matter, that fit for the student and program matter more? Does it really matter what your neighbors think?
If someone is interested in writing, that student might do much better at U of Iowa than at a school ranked in the top 25. If a student is interested in Engineering, he needs to go to a school that offers Engineering.
@twoinanddone I agree that a school does not have to have a top ranking to be a good fit. However, for out of state schools, I wanted some objective basis to evaluate schools. I didnt want to look at Princeton or USWNR as those seemed geared to the same elite schools. However, I thought someone might suggest another ranking source. We are looking at graduation rates but those may be low if a school has some commuter or nontraditional students. Son will ask coach about athlete’s graduation rates.Son will go on OVs to schools which helps to determine team chemistry, but he may not find out a lot about school academics from visiting one class or talking to the academic support team.A lot of rankings lag too. Schools may have put new programs in place but it may take a few years for results to show and rankings to improve. At his remaining schools, there is a lot we like at those schools, and also factors we dislike, and an objective ranking report might help as far as distinguishing between the schools.
Rather than base any decision on rankings from a third party, talk to the people at the schools you are interested in. Most OVs will include a meeting with an athletic academic advisor. This person will tell you if the school cares about athletic grad rates or not and if so, can explain if they rates are high because athletes are encouraged to major in something meaningful that they want for a career or if they are high because in order to be on the team you are assigned a bogus major. Be on the lookout for teams where everyone is a “General Studies” or Health Sciences” major.
My son was told flat out that he would not be able to keep a STEM major at one D1 school in the SEC. The advisor told all recruits at an info session, that all the school cared about was keeping athletes grades high enough to be eligible. The rankings of that school (USNW) where in line with other large state universities but would have been meaningless to reference, since the experience for athletes was very different than the general student population. The athletic grad rates on the NCAA web site were also deceiving, they report 5 year rates and don’t reflect if an athlete is coerced into taking something he doesn’t want to just to get some kind of degree.
My son transferred to an academically lower ranked school but it is a better fit for him because he will come out with a degree he wants vs. one that “fits”. While he didn’t transfer for academic reasons, at his first school he attended, grad rates for athlete were very high (95+) but for both of the two semesters he was there, he was not allowed to sign up for the exact classes he wanted because lab times overlapped with practice and the coach did not allow for any variation. So take a look at the numbers/ranking, but make sure you keep them in perspective.
So the biggest problem with rankings is that they measure what some one else thinks is important in a school – typically (but not always) selectivity. If I were a statistician (which I am not), I would think that any site or ranking that is based on a small sampling of anecdotes about would be utterly worthless as a predictor of what my son might want or like in a school. Most of the people who feel strongly enough to write the anecdote would be outliers of one sort or the other.
What makes more sense is to use the data in the rankings to assess what your son feels is important. So, if graduating in four years is important, you might compare schools based on the four year graduation rate contained in USNWR.
If you look closely at your post, you will see what is important in a school for you. You need to figure out what is important to your son (beyond “not an LAC”). Once you figure that out, go out to a few schools and see which ones fit the bill. As OnTrack suggests, talk to some of the kids at the schools, not the ones on their honeymoon or with an ax to grind. You will find the “fit.”
I find the graduation rate or the graduate-in-four-years rate to be unreliable for state schools (most of the D1 schools), because many in-state people may take one or two classes and drop out, or try to go to school and work, and life just gets in the way of completing their degree. For private schools, it seems useful. It also could be useful if you can track scholarship athletes specifically. Otherwise I would pay no attention to it.
Tendency is to like the rankings which reflect results with which you agree. The support/justify the methods. If results are not agreeable, criticize the methods.
Its also critical that differences in the various lists (such as #2 versus #9) are HUGE. Night and day difference between the schools. Such that going to #2 is awesome and going to #9 should be hidden from all but closest family members and maybe your priest (presumably as part of some type of confession of sin).
The NCAA has graduation rates. Some are horrible (Kentucky men’s basketball), others are at 100%. Doesn’t really help much to compare sports or programs as they are all different.