<p>I think most Mudd students would agree that Mudd is seriously underrated by the USNWR year after year in the overall LAC rankings. </p>
<p>Why are so we underrated?</p>
<p>What should our real ranking be?</p>
<p>I’d guess that Mudd is underrated because it fills a particular niche (science, engineering, mathematics etc.) that most other LACs tend not to emphasize. Because the USNEWS is forced to categorize all the schools it rates (LACs, Universities, Masters Programs etc.), Mudd is assessed on criteria better suited for traditional LACs. It’s position on the West Coast probably doesn’t help too much either, as the majority of surveyed schools, all of which file peer assessments, are located on the east coast. </p>
<p>What should your real ranking be? If you value close interaction with professors, and are interested in the sciences, I think you could make a strong case for Mudd being #1.</p>
<p>I also believe the short list of majors we provide does not help us too much, especially since the primary goal of a liberal arts college is to impart general knowledge rather than vocational/professional skills, which I guess we could lack when compared to the other colleges due to the limited classes we offer. True we may take classes at the other CCs, but does that mean USN can count those in our favor? no. because they would practically have to tie us with the other Claremont colleges.</p>
<p>Besides, Im still happy with being #1 in Engineering for Colleges that do not offer a doctoral degrees with a very impressive 4.5. I might be a physics major but that right there is still a showcase of the power behind our science and engineering curriculum.</p>
<p>Probably right up with Pomona, or tied in 4th with them</p>
<p>We are #1 in non-doctoral engineering schools because, in my opinion, that is a category that better fits HMC. If there were categories for non-doctoral colleges for science & mathematics, we would be very high in those rankings as well.</p>
<p>Of course, the academic rigor and other aspects of HMC are indeed top-notch. We are very good at what we do and we know it (so do others). But there is more to college than rigor in science and engineering. I think that we are doing just fine in the rankings as it is. We are among many other highly respectable colleges and these things are very imprecise – it would be silly to think that even rank #1 is significantly “better” than rank #15.</p>
<p>LOL. Mudd should be ranked 100 for LACs.</p>
<p>But really, it is amazing that we are #15 since we do not fit the ‘typical LAC’ bill. We are a strange type of institution that is too engineering-like for LACs yet too LAC-like for engineering schools. We are not a grad school… so we got stuck in the LAC category.</p>
<p>atomic, my young padawan, you’ll soon learn how mudd’s education transcends rankings and prestige. i’m an average mudder and i was declared a genius at jpl/caltech last week by my boss. seriously, w.t.f?</p>
<p>i love/hate mudd. great place to learn, great place to feel horrible about yourself.</p>
<p>RocketDA, you may be an average Mudder in terms of grades, but when it comes to knowledge of rocketry and overall aeronautics, you are a genius, even among Mudders. No joke.</p>
<p>On a side note, Harvey Mudd teachers just got love from the Princeton Review:</p>
<h1>2 in Professors Get High Marks (#1 is Wellesley)</h1>
<p>and</p>
<h1>2 in Professors Make Themselves Accessible (#1 is US Air Force)</h1>
<p>I wonder what that says about our professors overall. </p>
<p>however we moved from 3rd to 5th in Students who never stop Studying. quit slacking</p>
<p>“RocketDA, you may be an average Mudder in terms of grades, but when it comes to knowledge of rocketry and overall aeronautics, you are a genius, even among Mudders. No joke.”</p>
<p>Thanks Tiyusufaly but I consider myself average in the population of Mudd. Nice words though :)</p>
<p>probably right under pomona.</p>
<p>I think Mudd doesn’t belong in that ranking because it’s so unique. It kind of would make more sense to me to just group the Claremont Colleges together as one unit and then include that as a ranked item. The fact that Mudd has so few majors and all technically oriented makes me feel like it doesn’t belong with the rest in that list.</p>
<p>I find it amazing that HMC is top-ranked in the liberal arts colleges when all of the serious majors are STEM fields: the fact that your school pwns in LAC rankings as a tech school is a serious mark of pride! Even though 35% of the curriculum is dedicated to the liberal arts, the fact that only 35% of Mudd is required to make 15th slot in the USNEWS rankings is amazing. Personally, I find the USNEWS rankings silly anyway.</p>
<p>Also, it’s ranked #3 with Cal Poly for electrical engineering, second in computer engineering and tied for top overall without offering <em>any</em> specific engineering degrees - and it only needs 65% of its curriculum in STEM fields to do it :D</p>
<p>Don’t forget that Mudd also pulls it off without having an obscenely huge endowment per student ratio, less than a 1000 students and an admissions rate 3x that of the top-ranked ivies.</p>
<p>Go Mudders!</p>