College Ranking Lists - Forbes, US News and thoughts

[bilbo28]

Or - why I don't like US News ranking...Part I It is less about like and more - what list applies most to a player and parents.

Full disclosure, both my kid's schools look better on Forbes list. But I wanted to know why. Of course there are other lists, but I'm just looking at these two (although US News is really 4). I'm really more posting about the nuances of the US News ranking that is the most often quoted and used.

So here are the lists:
Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/top-colleges/list/#tab:rank
US News: http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandr...ges/rankings/national-universities?int=9ff208

Here is the Methodology:
Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/sites/carolin...nking-2016-the-full-methodology/#459b237b59a8
US News: http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/how-us-news-calculated-the-rankings

Thought #1 - Four Lists vs One based on two things.

Right off the bat you see US News splits the groups into National Universities and Liberal Arts, Regional Universities and Regional colleges. So a student/parent needs to figure that out which list is important. I don' think (guess) most soccer parents are choosing schools on grad programs or National or Liberal Arts. But, that is how they are divided.
National vs Liberal Arts
"National Universities offer a full range of undergraduate majors, plus master's and doctoral programs, and emphasize faculty research. National Liberal Arts Colleges focus almost exclusively on undergraduate education. They award at least 50 percent of their degrees in the arts and sciences."

US News has four factors (grad vs non-grad AND >50% BS vs <50% BS) but two lists. And it puts some science only (BS degrees only) schools as Liberal Arts schools.

It is combining both the need for BS degrees (STEM) and offering masters/doctoral into being called a National University that is a bit confusing. Schools that only offer BS degrees, like the service academies (West Point, Navy, USAFA) or big SAT scoring and science focused Harvey Mudd or Pomona, to name a few, are Liberal Arts schools.

Forbes just ranks them all together.
As most parents are not so interested in grad work at this time (just a guess), the Forbes ranking of putting all together seems to be a better list. Suffice it to say by putting all in the same list a US News #X could be a Forbes X/2 (or X/4 but the Regional s usually are not of the same rank). For example (just an example) National list US News has Berkeley as #20. You might have heard or think that is a top 20 school, and it may be. But is Berkeley better than #1-#20 National Liberal Arts schools? Put them in one list and that changes rankings. People don't like going from #20 to #30 something. So while folks may like things the way they are both/all 4 US News lists in common speak have inflate rankings quoted - by a whole bunch.

More to discuss:
US News Ranking criteria
Financial resources (10 percent) -
Graduation rate performance (7.5 percent)
Student selectivity (12.5 percent)
Undergraduate academic reputation (22.5 percent)
Retention (22.5 percent)
Alumni giving rate (5 percent)
Faculty resources (20 percent)

I think this is a very interesting topic, even though it only touches tangentially to soccer. When comparing the two lists, the obvious difference is the Forbes includes the smaller liberal arts schools and the service academies, so most schools drop a bit from US News to Forbes. But here are the biggest drops:

Johns Hopkins (from 11 to 66)
Emory (from 21 to 67)
NYU (from 32 to 77)
Washington U (from 17 to 60)
Carnegie Mellon (from 23 to 63)
USC (from 25 to 65)
Cal Tech (from 10 to 39)

These are schools that seem to be dropping out of the elite category, even when factoring in the additions of the liberal arts schools. There weren't that many big gainers, Boston College moved up from 30 to 22, and Tufts moved from 27 to 18, but none really jumped from non-elite to elite. So my question is, why the big drop for some pretty prestigious schools? Especially Johns Hopkins, which by reputation is one of the elite research institutions in the country. Is it really #66? Is Caltech really #39? I was always surprised to see Washington U in the top 20 anyways, so that one didn't surprise me as much.

 

[bilbo28]

Next one -Not even on Forbes, but on US New: Student selectivity (12.5 percent)
Forbes does not use it at all.
12.5% is pretty small, but I don't know why that should matter at all as it is not reflective of the incoming freshman ability or smarts.
UCLA gets tens of thousands of apps, as does Stanford, as does Pepperdine. That is not always reflective of the ability of the student, or the school. It may reflect location and and student's location.
CalTech is less selective than Stanford but the qualifications of those at Caltech are much higher from an academic standpoint. I asked CalTech's admin guy about that and he said almost all that apply are qualified for the 200 or so spots. They get few applications, but those under 2,200SAT who don't have a passion for research, don't bother to apply. There are many D3/liberal art/boutique schools that are less selective (as a percent) because they are trying to get a certain type of student. Those students are no less qualified than those selected to the most selective schools.

I also don't know how it is calculated. Maybe someone can explain.
Pepperdine said it had 880 openings for 11,800 applicants for 2016 - 7.5%, yet they have an acceptance rate of 37%
The service academies I don't have a clue how they calculate that number. Because of the nomination process the selectivity varies a whole bunch based on region the potential student is from.

Anyway - it is a number I think Forbes is smart to not even use.

I agree with you on this one wholeheartedly, because student selectivity is one area that a college can pump up without spending a lot of money and without improving the quality of their education. What's the easiest, quickest way to improve your ranking? GET MORE STUDENTS TO APPLY! WAY MORE! Hence the advertising - the constant flyers, brochures, emails, extended application deadlines, waived application fees, etc. The more students that apply, the more selective you will seem to be, even if the quality of your students does not change appreciably.

 

[Zoro]

....
These are schools that seem to be dropping out of the elite category, even when factoring in the additions of the liberal arts schools. There weren't that many big gainers, Boston College moved up from 30 to 22, and Tufts moved from 27 to 18, but none really jumped from non-elite to elite. So my question is, why the big drop for some pretty prestigious schools? Especially Johns Hopkins, which by reputation is one of the elite research institutions in the country. Is it really #66? Is Caltech really #39? I was always surprised to see Washington U in the top 20 anyways, so that one didn't surprise me as much.

When I looked at both their stated ranking criteria - one just made more sense to me.
Elite = ?? As I pointed out put two lists together and the average goes down (up) by 2X. So a 10 may now be a 20.

Guessing time...
Cal Tech is a research school. Incoming freshman class size is about 200. So while the kids may be brilliant going in, what they produce is research. That may be valued less than the near equally as smart kids going into Harvey Mudd who come out application oriented. That may reflect in ROI.

Also as in my cause comment a few posts ago - hard to rate how good the school is when everyone going in is already that smart and they come out - that smart. Are they that much different than when they went in?

The "ranking" that might mean the most to some is the Payscale one. As this is my wife's profession she pretty much explained me that the sampling is too small and it is very regional. So a Cal State San Jose gets huge numbers based on location. And our service academies don't really hit until time has been paid off and they are in professional jobs. Mid-career at 10 years they are below a mid-career of 15, 20 where they are near the top.

But everyone likes a list - so here it is:
http://www.payscale.com/college-salary-report/bachelors?page=69

 

[Zoro]

I think this is a very interesting topic, even though it only touches tangentially to soccer. ...

Age U15-U16 this is about the only parent conversation we had at girls soccer practice.

 

[mirage]

The "ranking" that might mean the most to some is the Payscale one. As this is my wife's profession she pretty much explained me that the sampling is too small and it is very regional. So a Cal State San Jose gets huge numbers based on location. And our service academies don't really hit until time has been paid off and they are in professional jobs. Mid-career at 10 years they are below a mid-career of 15, 20 where they are near the top.

But everyone likes a list - so here it is:
http://www.payscale.com/college-salary-report/bachelors?page=69

I hate lists like this because its one of those things that you can use statistics to skew the result such that it can give a wrong interpretation than what the reader want to know.

More than half of 10 years in salaries listed are below college-hire starting wage for engineers. In other words, its is profession dependent and location dependent. SUNY (very high cost of living - NYC) probably has people working in the region. Harvey Mudd produces engineers and physicist so their starting salary reflects that marketplace and essentially SoCal wage structure. Since they don't have liberal arts degree, it doesn't dilute their salary numbers. Need to look at the liberal arts part of Claremont colleges (CMC comes in at 44th). Harvard, on the other hand, is a liberal arts school and while they have STEM content (28%) and degrees, that's not why people go there (they goto MIT).

As for military academy officers, the base wages are tied to rank and grade scale and tops out at the pay of US Congressman, until one makes SES grade or equivalent. They hit the jackpot especially when they leave the military and goto private sector as middle to senior management (e.g., Col/Cap=Director; Gen/Adm=VP) with stock grants/options and other perks not included in this list. Often the base pay is less than 50% of total compensation when incentive compensation package is included. But this happens after 20+ years and not 10.

Just to finish this thought, a grad from CSU in BS engineering with good grades will land a spot at around $65K~$75K/yr as the starting salary, depending on the industry chosen. Mechanical and industrial engineering on the lower side and chemical and electrical engineering on the higher side, with all other in between.

 

[Zoro]

... Since they don't have liberal arts degree
...
Harvard, on the other hand, is a liberal arts school

How could this be?
US News puts Harvey Mudd on Liberal Arts list.
And Harvard is not on their Liberal Arts list.

Which was part of my point #1 why US News ranking is not that useful to soccer parents.

 

[Zoro]

Does any poster prefer the US News ranking, and if so why?

 

[bilbo28]

I'm not sure about which one I prefer, but I would say that the US News ranking is more influential, in both academia and for companies hiring people. No matter what Forbes says, I don't think Johns Hopkins is the 66th ranked college in the country, and I don't think Caltech is #39. On the one hand Forbes has all the school ranked together, which is convenient, but I'm not sure it is that helpful to compare a small, private liberal arts school to a large, state university. They have different missions and different target audiences. I also think there is something missing from both of them, which is cost, and hence value. I think Money Magazine ranks colleges based on value with a different set of criteria. I'm not sure that any ranking is that "useful" to a parent, other than to know what the general opinion of a college's overall quality is. If you want to know what the general opinion is, go with the most popular ranking. That's US News right now.

 

[fudbaler]

Personally, I think all the rankings are worthless for choosing a college for undergraduate studies. Maybe rankings of schools by major might help a person identify some lesser known schools to look into with decent programs in the major they are interested in, but that's about it.

Graduate rankings cetainly matter more for Law (like the T14 schools) and for Medical school but this is in part because the field of Law in the US has not changed as much and the Top T14 school rankings literraly haven't changed in the last 20 years. Similiar for MDs. Established medical programs do matter.

For undergraduate degress there are about 2400 schools. For graduate studies there are probably < 500. Even fewer Law schools and Medical schools. Any top 240 ranked undergraduate degree school puts a kid in the top 10% of undergraduate programs if percentages even really matter.

For undergraduate degrees, especially STEM fields, everybody is teaching generally the same ABET accredited stuff so it mostly doesn't matter where a kid goes as long as they follow some simple advice like the advice given by Alan Krueger based on some sound economic research:

"Find a school whose academic strengths match your interests and that devotes resources to instruction in those fields. Recognize that your own motivation, ambition and talents will determine your success more than the college name on your diploma."

For some great reading on these topics I would highly recommend the book "It's the Student Not the College" (https://www.amazon.com/Its-Student-Not-College-School_Without/dp/1615192379) and especially Chapters 1 and 2... "Busting the Elite-College Myth" and "Examining the Link between Top Colleges and Success". Chapter 3 "Realities of College Life Today" is a gem as well as is most of the book.

For example the bit on recruiting at Google (below) is spot on...rankings matter for colleges and the rankings marketing business to make money..and that's about it:

"RECRUITING AT GOOGLE A CNN/Money survey of college students around the world found that a job at Google is the most sought-after position for new college graduates. 37 Google is an innovative global technology leader headquartered in Mountain View, California, with more than 46,000 employees. Two million people per year submit resumes to Google, hoping to land one of about one thousand new positions annually. 38 Candidates are rated on their leadership potential, their knowledge, their humility, and how they think. As the Google website says, “Googlers are people who want to do cool things that matter.” What candidates aren’t rated on is the selectivity of the college they attended. Very little focus is paid even to the grades earned. Google is at the forefront of a trend toward evaluating applicants based on their skills and potential, rather than their pedigree. Laszlo Bock, the senior vice president of people operations for Google, explained to The New York Times , “Your college degree is not a proxy anymore for having the skills or traits to do any job.” 39 He indicated that Google is looking for general cognitive ability, such as the ability to think on your feet, to pull together bits of information into one theme, and to learn and adapt to an ever-changing field. Bock told The New York Times that GPAs and test scores are both “worthless” hiring criteria. He went on to discuss Google’s main hiring attributes, which include: coding ability for technology roles (which are half of Google positions) general cognitive ability (not IQ, but the ability to learn or to process information on the fly)
emergent leadership (knowing when to lead and when to follow) humility and ownership (the ability to accept other people’s ideas when they are better) 40 Working on a team (see Chapter 5 , step 7) or holding a part-time job or internship (see step 5) while in school might help you develop these qualities. When asked again about GPAs, Bock conceded, “Grades certainly don’t hurt.” If an applicant’s grades reflect real skills that she can apply on the job, then that is valuable to Google, or any firm. 41 Bock’s advice for college students is: “Make sure that you’re getting out of it not only a broadening of your knowledge, but skills that will be valued in today’s workplace.” 42 This is a warning not to relax during college and expect to thrive in the current economy because of your college degree. It’s important to develop skills and strengths in college, and that might not happen without extra effort on your part."

 

[bilbo28]

Personally, I think all the rankings are worthless for choosing a college for undergraduate studies. Maybe rankings of schools by major might help a person identify some lesser known schools to look into with decent programs in the major they are interested in, but that's about it.

Graduate rankings cetainly matter more for Law (like the T14 schools) and for Medical school but this is in part because the field of Law in the US has not changed as much and the Top T14 school rankings literraly haven't changed in the last 20 years. Similiar for MDs. Established medical programs do matter.

For undergraduate degress there are about 2400 schools. For graduate studies there are probably < 500. Even fewer Law schools and Medical schools. Any top 240 ranked undergraduate degree school puts a kid in the top 10% of undergraduate programs if percentages even really matter.

For undergraduate degrees, especially STEM fields, everybody is teaching generally the same ABET accredited stuff so it mostly doesn't matter where a kid goes as long as they follow some simple advice like the advice given by Alan Krueger based on some sound economic research:

"Find a school whose academic strengths match your interests and that devotes resources to instruction in those fields. Recognize that your own motivation, ambition and talents will determine your success more than the college name on your diploma."

For some great reading on these topics I would highly recommend the book "It's the Student Not the College" (https://www.amazon.com/Its-Student-Not-College-School_Without/dp/1615192379) and especially Chapters 1 and 2... "Busting the Elite-College Myth" and "Examining the Link between Top Colleges and Success". Chapter 3 "Realities of College Life Today" is a gem as well as is most of the book.

For example the bit on recruiting at Google (below) is spot on...rankings matter for colleges and the rankings marketing business to make money..and that's about it:

"RECRUITING AT GOOGLE A CNN/Money survey of college students around the world found that a job at Google is the most sought-after position for new college graduates. 37 Google is an innovative global technology leader headquartered in Mountain View, California, with more than 46,000 employees. Two million people per year submit resumes to Google, hoping to land one of about one thousand new positions annually. 38 Candidates are rated on their leadership potential, their knowledge, their humility, and how they think. As the Google website says, “Googlers are people who want to do cool things that matter.” What candidates aren’t rated on is the selectivity of the college they attended. Very little focus is paid even to the grades earned. Google is at the forefront of a trend toward evaluating applicants based on their skills and potential, rather than their pedigree. Laszlo Bock, the senior vice president of people operations for Google, explained to The New York Times , “Your college degree is not a proxy anymore for having the skills or traits to do any job.” 39 He indicated that Google is looking for general cognitive ability, such as the ability to think on your feet, to pull together bits of information into one theme, and to learn and adapt to an ever-changing field. Bock told The New York Times that GPAs and test scores are both “worthless” hiring criteria. He went on to discuss Google’s main hiring attributes, which include: coding ability for technology roles (which are half of Google positions) general cognitive ability (not IQ, but the ability to learn or to process information on the fly)
emergent leadership (knowing when to lead and when to follow) humility and ownership (the ability to accept other people’s ideas when they are better) 40 Working on a team (see Chapter 5 , step 7) or holding a part-time job or internship (see step 5) while in school might help you develop these qualities. When asked again about GPAs, Bock conceded, “Grades certainly don’t hurt.” If an applicant’s grades reflect real skills that she can apply on the job, then that is valuable to Google, or any firm. 41 Bock’s advice for college students is: “Make sure that you’re getting out of it not only a broadening of your knowledge, but skills that will be valued in today’s workplace.” 42 This is a warning not to relax during college and expect to thrive in the current economy because of your college degree. It’s important to develop skills and strengths in college, and that might not happen without extra effort on your part."

I'm going to check out that book, because I have reached the same conclusion the hard way after going through the college process with 2 daughters. Paying for the Party is another good book, especially if you have daughters. While I don't agree with all of the conclusions (like abolishing Greek system), the case studies are interesting.

 

[fudbaler]

My kids needed two different kinds of school. One kid is an introvert, the other an extrovert.
One needed structure and the other the kind of opportunity that come leveraging a brand and connections.

Maybe this is old-school, but for the Google type exceptions that hire 1,000/year, other companies still hire primarily from a list of schools. ARCO (when they were not owned by BP) used to hire MBAs only from the top 10 MBA schools. Deloitte has a list.
What VPs from what firms go to career day is interesting and something we never looked at in selecting a college was what / who was recruiting at the college. I really have no idea how to find that information in a list. But in some areas the top firms sent their upper folks to hire in certain majors, while in other majors there was lessor representation. The firms have their preferences. It is like soccer club/college recruiting all over again.

There is much of old school still going around. Some of that seems to come from the 1971 Griggs v. Duke Power Company supreme court ruling (How the Supreme Court Created the Student Loan Bubble: http://spectator.org/60741_how-supreme-court-created-student-loan-bubble/). From the article:

The Griggs decision has made that organic rise through the ranks impossible, as disparate impact left businesses liable for those who failed to pass hiring tests. “Most legitimate job selection practices, including those that predict productivity better than alternatives, will routinely trigger liability under the current rule,” Wax wrote in a 2011 paper titled “Disparate Impact Realism.”
The solution for businesses post-Griggs was obvious: outsource screening to colleges, which are allowed to weed out poor candidates based on test scores. The bachelor’s degree, previously reserved for academics, doctors, and lawyers, became the de facto credential required for any white-collar job.
By the late 1970s, universities were in crisis mode. The baby boom produced more students than they knew what to do with, but declining birth rates left them with a smaller pool of tuition-paying students. Their new role as the gateway to respectable careers and higher salaries solved that problem. They replaced comprehensive liberal arts education with career-oriented majors that displaced the apprentice, rise-from-the-bottom system that had previously defined the American labor market. Curriculum quality and homework rates plunged, but endowments swelled.

The 'new' school thinking might be doing away with relying on degrees like Google does and like I know I have to do. I would find it to be a huge risk to hire only based on the college pedigree and gpa. Hiring based on what a person actually knows, the kind of experience (usually 2 quality paid internships for a college grad) and how they will fit into the team trumps the designer label of the degree by a large factor for me. Again, in the area of law the T14 schools matter a lot.

The book I cited explores hiring practices as well. Here are 2 excerpts:

Conflicting opinions between the American public and business leaders when considering the importance of the college attended
A recent Gallup poll shows conflicting opinions between the American public and business leaders when considering the importance of the college attended by the
by the applicant in the hiring process. The survey of 623 business leaders showed that only 9 percent of them rated “where a candidate received his or her college degree” as “very important,” and 54 percent rated it as “not very important” or “not at all important.” However, when 1,000 United States citizens were polled, 30 percent of them said that where a job candidate received his or her degree was “very important” and only 20 percent rated it as “not very important” or “not at all important.” 32 The business leaders’ focus was on knowledge and applied skills, with 84 percent rating the candidate’s “amount of knowledge in the field” as very important, and 79 percent viewing the candidate’s applied skills in the field as very important. We can also look at students’ academic performance while they are at college. All young people are on a journey, and sometimes even students at elite colleges decide to focus more on parties than on their academics, while their counterpart at a middle-tier school may decide that he does not have the luxury of slacking off. These students’ college GPAs and transcripts will make the distinction clear to hiring managers, who may be more inclined to hire the harder-working student. Involvement in on-campus activities, work experience in paid jobs or internships, and cultivation of professional relationships are additional areas of focus for motivated students, which slackers often ignore—again, regardless of the schools they attend.

CAMPUS RECRUITING BY FINANCE, CONSULTING, AND OTHER SELECTIVE FIRMS The biggest doubters of the theory that attending an elite college will not affect your future earnings are those who hope to work on Wall Street or at consulting or other selective firms. They cite the common belief that these firms only recruit at elite colleges, so those attending the majority of universities are out of luck. While it is true that investment banks and consulting firms have “target schools” where they focus more of their recruiting attention, this is not their only hiring pool. Their incoming analyst and summer intern programs typically include several students who were hired outside the campus-visit and recruiting sessions. These students may have had connections with people at the firm who helped them get a job, or they may have simply applied online and been selected based on their resume, high SAT score, and credentials. McKinsey & Company, a prestigious consulting firm, indicates on its website that besides the elite private colleges, it does campus interviewing at the Universities of Michigan, North Carolina, California, and Texas, as well as at Georgia Tech. It also states, “McKinsey interviews candidates from a variety of undergraduate sources, including large state colleges and universities and smaller private institutions. Even if we are unable to come in person to your campus, we are still interested in reviewing your application.
your application.” Goldman Sachs recruits at many top colleges, but has also recently visited campuses and hired employees from Spelman, Villanova, Carnegie Mellon, and Brigham Young University. Let’s face it: getting hired by a top firm is difficult, no matter where you go to college. The reality is that most students get their first jobs outside the campus recruiting process. No matter what college you graduate from, you have to be aggressive and ambitious in your job search. Keep in mind that starting at less popular firms and building up your experience and skills is an effective way to get to the top in your field. See Chapter 8 for more suggestions on job hunting.

 

[Zoro]

...The survey of 623 business leaders showed that only 9 percent of them rated “where a candidate received his or her college degree” as “very important,” and 54 percent rated it as “not very important” or “not at all important.” ...

There are lies, damn lies and statistics.

Who are those 9% who think it is very important? I'm going to assume it is not the mom and pop shops. I assume it is more like @mirage posted about for GS.

Then there are the additional 37% that see it somewhat important. Are there enough kids in the 9% top schools to cover that 9% demand for high ranking school grads and the 37% that still care about name?

That school is important to them, would mean they would hire what they can afford first from the top 1%, then 2% etc in the majors they are looking for.
Seems to me it is very important to be in that top group that 46% care somewhat or very much about.

 

[mirage]

The book example of hires out of GA Tech, Carnegie Mellon and alike has to do with the field of study. For an example, it's well known that GA Texh is THE best engineering school in the nation. Not research but engineering - there is a difference. CM is the top AI/robotics and CS school in the nation. Again, it is field dependent.

It's silly to say GS or McKinsey or Bain hires from these schools universally. These grads are hired into a particular domain expertise in their practice.

As for internships, that is the way many top firms hire college grads. But to have a chance to be an intern increases with school known for some top quality of domain knowledge. It's not just T14/20. It's by major/field of study.

 

[fudbaler]

If a kid follows Kruger's advice and finds a school whose academic strengths match the kid's interests and the school devotes resources to instruction in those fields they'll be fine. As he says a student's motivation, ambition and talents will determine their success more than the college name on the diploma.

For example for CS UCI is a great choice since they are the only school in UC system with a school of Comp Sci not just a dept. They are devoting a lot of resources to the school. Plenty of opportunities for research/internships. Their BS in Informatics (stepchild field of CS) has 18 companies paying UCI to have access to undergrad projects. UC Santa Barbara is another great choice for CS and they top the payscale comp sci ranking based on mid career pay. Nvidia loves to recruit from UCSB CS. Cal Poly SLO is a gem as well. Probably the best deal around for CS/SE/CE. UC Santa Cruz CS holds its own and they're Bioinformatics is top notch due to their early contribution in genome sequencing. I've hired and worked w grads from Cal Poly Pomona and Lehigh CS...top notch. SF State CS combined w Computing in Life Sciences prepares kids well too.

None of these schools (except maybe SLO) are considered top designer label school CS names but they prepare interested, motivated and talented kids well for CS and provide plenty of opportunities.

Krueger's research shows no statistical difference in terms of career success (except for minorities) between elite/non elite for undergrads but things change significantly a when comparing grad degrees. There too, the big name CS grad programs dont care where a kid did their undergrad. They care what the kid did while in their undergrad program. Stanford MS in CS literally says for undergrad programs that they care that they've kind of heard of the school.

So, a kid can do their undergrad in a decent progream but not top ranked progran and go for the designer stuff in grad school.

There are just plenty of great choices beneath the brand name schools that will prepare kids for great careers in CS and other fields.

 

[mirage]

So, a kid can do their undergrad in a decent progream but not top ranked progran and go for the designer stuff in grad school.

There are just plenty of great choices beneath the brand name schools that will prepare kids for great careers in CS and other fields.

I believe everyone agree with this point. If a student is committed to continue onto a graduate study, then undergrad is not as significant.

If a profession that require PhD/MD/JD is chosen, then holistically one can look at the undergrad as simply a compulsory degree and focus on GRE/LSAT/MCAS and so on, along with GPA. Think of it as what high school is to college, undergrad is to grad school.

However, there are plenty of profession that do not require graduate degree. For those it matters which school is selected for what profession. As I've mentioned in earlier post, the place of graduation only matter when considering which track a college hire is placed onto when starting a career. It has a propagating effect well into mid to late career, even if they go on to obtain graduate degree.

Personally, I view the college choice as option of possibilities for my kid upon college graduation. Like all parents, I want to set up my kid to have the best options available to him. Otherwise, a degree is a degree and who cares about where it came from as long as it is legit.

 

[fudbaler]

I believe everyone agree with this point. If a student is committed to continue onto a graduate study, then undergrad is not as significant.

If a profession that require PhD/MD/JD is chosen, then holistically one can look at the undergrad as simply a compulsory degree and focus on GRE/LSAT/MCAS and so on, along with GPA. Think of it as what high school is to college, undergrad is to grad school.

However, there are plenty of profession that do not require graduate degree. For those it matters which school is selected for what profession. As I've mentioned in earlier post, the place of graduation only matter when considering which track a college hire is placed onto when starting a career. It has a propagating effect well into mid to late career, even if they go on to obtain graduate degree.

Personally, I view the college choice as option of possibilities for my kid upon college graduation. Like all parents, I want to set up my kid to have the best options available to him. Otherwise, a degree is a degree and who cares about where it came from as long as it is legit.

I went back and re-read your post. I'm not questioning what you stated that some companies are looking at the name of the school as an important factor. They might have their reasons but there are so many other companies for which it is too much of a risk to rely on the name of the institution as the most important factor. Some of this comes from huge grade inflation over the years. I think I read that it's been .15 per decade over the last 4 decades. I think Harvard's average GPA is now 3.7. Aside from grade inflation, there is the phenomenon that amount of time students spend on schoolwork (classes and studying) per week has fallen significantly. So students are spending less time studying but the GPAs are higher? Adding to that the measures of various skills like critical thinking, reading comprehension etc are showing no improvement after a few years in college seems like it would logically lead most companies to be inclined to not trust the elite or any diploma and high GPA and would have to rely on other factors more to determine whether that student really was an outstanding A student. These other factor would likely be detailed testing at interviews, evaluation of the type and number of internships etc. This is why I keep saying that the diploma doesn't mean much. What matters is what the student did at school and what they learned. The extent of deep learning they experience matters the most IMO. For Comp Sci if a kid is in a decent program they're pretty much learning the same stuff as in any other program. If they want to shine more they can get involved in some open source project and have it readily available on github for employers to clearly see what the person is capable of. This way a kid can pretty much make their own internship from the comfort of their home in their free time. This open source example kind of ties in to my main argument...schools, elite or not, are not the gate keepers or trusted barometers of the quality of the student anymore. Just like with open source there is less of a need for an intermediary controlling entity. As that book I cited says elite schools collect aleady successful students capable of even more rather than making successful students. After these kids graduate the schools take credit for making the kids successful. That's going to get harder and harder to do in the future and the elite schools will have to find a way to truly differentiate themselves aside from doing everything possible to appear high on rankings.


BTW Regarding Google...if a kid's dream is to work at Google they should probably check out the company Google modeled its workplace practices after...SAS Institute: http://www.fastcompany.com/3004953/how-sas-became-worlds-best-place-work

 

[soccermanifesto]

I'm not sure about which one I prefer, but I would say that the US News ranking is more influential, in both academia and for companies hiring people. No matter what Forbes says, I don't think Johns Hopkins is the 66th ranked college in the country, and I don't think Caltech is #39.

This, this, 1000 x this. Anyone who has worked in Academia for 10 minutes knows this. Don't know why Zoro is so obsessive in trying to invalidate US News rankings, or why people who have no idea what they're talking about downgrade this post or agree with Zoro. Volume posting, or being generally liked for whatever reason, doesn't make your case correct.

If you think Johns Hopkins University is 66th in the nation, when even their tiny majors have impressive faculty and staff, I don't know what to tell you, other than opinions are like something else, but an uninformed opinion is less than useless.

 

[Zoro]

...
If you think Johns Hopkins University is 66th in the nation, when even their tiny majors have impressive faculty and staff, I don't know what to tell you, other than opinions are like something else, but an uninformed opinion is less than useless.

I can't find a post were anyone thought John's Hopkins was a 66th rank.

I was discussing what both rankings used as criteria (by listing what they say they use) and particularly the benefit, or not of those rankings to 15-16 year old players and parents making 4 year college selections.

I think USNew is more known and more respected. I also think the criteria they list for ranking is not as good of a fit for 15-16 year old soccer athletes as the criteria Forbes lists.

What criteria does USNews use that you prefer to Forbes for teen soccer athletes making college selection?

 

[soccerobserver]

Zoro, you are the first person I have ever heard of that uses these rankings to research colleges or select employees. When I have hired people I never used the rankings. I recruited from schools based upon reputation broadly speaking. I found that my best employees came from liberal arts schools with high admissions standards. I found that the kids who performed best initially were the ones with very technical educational (BA's in accounting or finance) backgrounds but that over time the liberal arts kids passed them. I stopped recruiting from certain schools because even the kids with 4.0's were not consistently smart kids. Then there are some schools where they do not teach what I needed from my employees. For example, a Harvard MBA will not be proficient in accounting because they teach it with the case method. So they need to have learned accounting from someplace else and unless that is clear on their resume they get passed over for other candidates.

For college research, if one still likes these lists, may I suggest also using Fiske's Guide to Colleges? http://www.fiskeguide.com/



It is less of a linear ranking system. The writers provide more nuanced descriptions of colleges. They go beyond the descriptions you see in a standard college brochure or website.

 

[Zoro]

Zoro, you are the first person I have ever heard of that uses these rankings to ... or select employees. ...

If you are reading the whole thread then I'm not the only person: http://www.socalsoccer.com/threads/college-ranking-lists-forbes-us-news-and-thoughts.257/#post-4719
While discussion about employee hiring and college selection are part of this thread, the purpose was in light of ranking criteria - used by the two. I am more interested in why they are different and why one is so popular. No debate from me USNews means more. What was interesting is the criteria of the other lined up more with what we, and what I hear parents are looking for.

Our selection was more in-line with fit than ranking.
Both kids ended up at lower ranked schools that fit (USNews) than what they could have with sports.
And both got into higher ranked schools than they likely would have without sports.

All were going to cost us roughly near as much (taking soccer out of it), so we looked within that top 100 in both soccer and academics because that was plenty of choices. DD wanted out of state, son didn't care.

I expect players at the most competitive clubs are looking in the top 100 ranks. Maybe because they can.

 

[soccerobserver]

Z your points are well taken. Somewhere along the thread it was asked which list people would recommend to help a HS student make a selection. I submit that neither list should be used for that purpose; that some of the college guides (Fiske etc) would be more helpful as a resource for achieving a good fit between the student/athlete and the college.