<p>Even a small liberal arts college typically offers about 50 courses of study
(<a href=“Academics :: Swarthmore College”>http://www.swarthmore.edu/academics.xml</a>). Only a couple of these have the remotest connection with banking & finance. Only a fairly small fraction of students at top colleges major in those fields.
On the other hand, the most popular college major in America, by far, is business.
More than 20% of all college students major in business. Yet, this is a major that many of our most prestigious, selective colleges don’t even offer. There seems to be a big mismatch between what most Americans expect out of a college education and what America’s “top” colleges actually teach. So it isn’t surprising that many people judge college quality by indicators that have little to do with what those colleges actually teach, or with their high-minded mission statements (which typically make reference to citizenship, leadership, knowledge discovery & dissemination).</p>
<p>Look at the Latin mottos of the world’s universities:
<a href=“List of university and college mottos - Wikipedia”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_university_mottos</a>
On that page, the word “knowledge” occurs 109 times.
The word “truth” occurs 104 times.
The word “science” occurs 45 times.
The word “wisdom” occurs 39 times.
The word “entrepreneur” occurs 4 times.
The word “job(s)” occurs zero times.
The word “money” occurs zero times.</p>
<p>If we take college mission statements and latin mottos seriously, then what does that say about how we should evaluate them? To me, it suggests that the metrics that should matter are the ones that measure knowledge discovery and dissemination by the faculty, the quality of the learning environment, the ability of schools to attract the best students and professors from all over the country, or their ability to motivate and prepare students for future knowledge-creation.
Examples: faculty publication and citation volumes; research expenditures per capita; PhD productivity; average class sizes; library volumes per capita; faculty salaries; faculty awards & distinctions; student selectivity.
Non-examples: average alumni salaries; ROTC and Peace Corps participation; Who’s Who entries; iBank recruitment.</p>
<p>The best rankings for undergraduates would be the ones that use the good (knowledge-related) metrics most relevant to undergraduates. In that respect, in my opinion, the US News rankings are better than the international rankings. </p>