USA College/Univ Data
U.S. News & World Report College and University rankings
Top 40 “National Universities” according to US News & World Report, 2007
Referred to as the “granddaddy of the college rankings”,[86] America’s best–known American college and university rankings have been compiled since 1983 by U.S. News & World Report and are widely regarded as the most influential of all college rankings.[87] This influence is partially attributed to the simple ranking system that U.S. News uses. The ranking order of universities has been shown to have great effect; a one-rank improvement leads to a 0.9% increase in number of applicants.[88]
The US News rankings are based upon data which U.S. News collects from each educational institution either from an annual survey or from the school’s website. It also considers opinion surveys of university faculty and administrators outside the school.[89] The college rankings were published in all years thereafter, except 1984.
United States National Research Council Rankings
Main article: United States National Research Council Rankings
The National Research Council ranks the doctoral research programmes of US universities, most recently in 1995.[90] Data collection for an updated ranking began in 2006.[91]
Faculty Scholarly Productivity rankings
The Faculty Scholarly Productivity Index by Academic Analytics ranks 354 institutions based on faculty publications, citations, research grants and awards.[92][93]
[edit] The Top American Research Universities
The Center for Measuring University Performance has ranked American research universities in the Top American Research Universities since 2000. The methodology is based on data such as research publications, citations, recognitions and funding, as well as undergraduate quality such as SAT scores. The information used can be found in public–accessible materials, reducing possibilities for manipulation. The methodology is generally consistent from year to year and changes are explained in the publication along with references from other studies.[94]
Washington Monthly College rankings
The Washington Monthly’s “College Rankings”, last published in 2010, began as a research report in 2005. Related rankings appeared in the September 2006 issue. It offers American university and college rankings[95] based upon how well each enhances social mobility, fosters scientific and humanistic research and promotes an ethic of service.[96]
TrendTopper MediaBuzz College Guide
TrendTopper MediaBuzz College Guide is an American-college guide based on what it calls “Internet brand equity” based on data collected from the Internet and global media sources. It ranks the Top 300 United States colleges and universities. The guide includes specialty and for profit schools including Art, Business, Design, Music, and Online Education. The TrendTopper MediaBuzz College Rankings are produced twice a year by the Global Language Monitor of Austin, Texas.
Time Magazine described internet brand equity as “a measure of who’s talking about you online, based on Internet data, social media, blogs and the top 75,000 print and electronic media outlets.[97] [98]
GLM ranks the schools “according to their online presence — or internet brand equity … By focusing on online presence, the Monitor hopes to avoid the biases that characterize other rankings, which commonly rely on the opinions of university officials and college counselors rather than that of the greater public.[99]” GLM believes the rankings provide an up-to-date perspective on which schools have the most popular brand. The resulting rankings gauge the relative value of the various institutions and how they change over time.
Forbes College rankings
In 2008, Forbes.com began publishing an annual list, prepared by the Center for College Affordability and Productivity[100] of “America’s Best Colleges”.[101] The Forbes rankings use the list of alumni published in Who’s Who in America, student evaluations from RateMyProfessors.com, self-reported salaries of alumni from PayScale, four-year graduation rates, numbers of students and faculty receiving “nationally competitive awards,” and four-year accumulated student debt to calculate the rankings.[102] The list emphasizes tuition costs, which boosts the ratings of the zero-cost United States Service academies. It disregards subjective measures such as public reputation, which causes some Ivy League colleges to score lower than in other lists.
American Council of Trustees and Alumni
In 2009, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) began grading colleges and universities based on the strength of their general education requirements. They assign a letter grade ranging from “A” to “F” to more than 700 four-year colleges and universities based on how many of seven subjects are required of students: composition, mathematics, intermediate-level foreign language, science, economics, literature and American government or history.[103] This rating has been endorsed by Mel Elfin, founding editor of U.S. News & World Report’s rankings.[104] New York Times higher education blogger Stanley Fish, while agreeing that universities ought to have a strong core curriculum, disagreed with some of the subjects ACTA includes in the core.[105] As of 2010, only 16 universities had earned an “A”.[106]
Revealed preference rankings
Avery et al. pioneered the use of choice modelling to rank colleges. Their methodology used a statistical analysis of the decisions of 3,240 students who applied to college in 1999.[107] MyChances.net adopted a similar approach starting in 2009,[108] stating that its method is based on this approach.[109] The study analysed students admitted to multiple colleges. The college they attended became the winner, and the others became the losers. An Elo rating system was used to assign points based on each win or loss, and the colleges were ranked based on their Elo points. A useful consequence of the use of Elo points is that they can be used to estimate the frequency with which students, upon being admitted to two schools, will choose one over the other.
Other rankings of US universities
Other organizations that rank US institutions include the Fiske Guide to Colleges and College Prowler. Many specialized rankings are available in guidebooks, considering individual student interests, fields of study, geographical location, financial aid and affordability.
Among the rankings dealing with individual fields of study is the Philosophical Gourmet Report or “Leiter Report”,[110] a ranking of philosophy departments. This report has attracted criticism from different viewpoints. Notably, practitioners of continental philosophy, who perceive the Leiter report as unfair to their field, have compiled alternative rankings.
The Gourman Report, last published in 1996, ranked the quality of undergraduate majors and graduate programs.
Gallup polls ask American adults, “All in all, what would you say is the best college or university in the United States?”[111]
The Princeton Review, annually publishes a book of Best Colleges. In 2011, this was titled The Best 373 Colleges. Phi Beta Kappa has also sought to establish chapters at the best schools, lately numbering 280.[112]