Northeastern rose another two spots in the US News and World Reports college ranking this year, but from a quick glance around campus, you wouldn’t know it. There are no banners of self-congratulation or parades and that’s exactly how it should be.
While the ranking continue to play an important role in how we view and evaluate academic institutions, a growing legion of schools have begun to discount them, several even going so far as to refuse to participate by not filling out the surveys necessary to gauge student happiness. There’s no need for Northeastern to go that far, but the time has come for us to put less focus on an outside evaluation and more on what is best for us, regardless of how US News and World Report sees it.
We should not discount the ranking entirely; employers and prospective students still use the report to evaluate Northeastern while determining the school’s worth and that of those who graduate. It is an important tool and, in theory, one that would serve the general public well. But too much stock has been put in ranking that can’t possibly measure the soul or feeling of a university. A high rank is nice, but we shouldn’t pin our self-worth on it.
A Northeastern education is more than what goes on in the classroom. For art and culture, students needn’t walk further than across the street to the Museum of Fine Arts. Learning the wily ways of the Green Line’s E train ingrains patience in those who try to ride it. Following the highs and lows of a Red Sox season teaches valuable lessons about passion and learning to swallow disappointment.
Instead of making changes to raise our rank, we should make them because it’s the right thing to do. We can’t let the prospect of moving up to ranking No. 94 instead of current No. 96 change how we make a decision or determine how we think of ourselves.
By making decisions that improve Northeastern for the student’s best interests alone, the school will become better. Choosing to let go of the pressure we have assigned to ourselves to move higher will be freeing. No longer should good teachers be fired for a lack of PhDs. We won’t worry about the size of our endowment for any other reason than we could use some more money. We can use the time and energy spent wailing away at our low profile to make changes that will improve our lives and make our educations more valuable.
The ranking also does not take into account one of the key things Northeastern has staked its reputation on: co-op. A major tenet of our school’s philosophy is experiential education, something a price or ranking can’t be attributed to. What’s more is that cooperative education appears to work. According to the co-op website, the median starting salary for Northeastern graduates in 2004 was $41,520. We don’t need the ranking to prove to employers that a Northeastern degree is worth something: we prove it to them ourselves.
Congratulations, Northeastern. We climbed two more places in the ranking, and maybe we even earned it. But now it’s time to end our dependent relationship with US News and World Report. We’ve had some good times, even shared a little bit of glory together. We’ll still be friends, but it’s time to stake out on our own, and hopefully, we’ll be better for it.
