By Stephen Sears
Yield rate. Retention. Peer assessment. Third tier. Not phrases you thought you would hear too much, right? Now, they have joined “BU sucks,” “co-op” and “tuition increase” as commonplace here on Huntington Avenue.
The U.S. News and World Report, as you all must know by now, recently released its annual college rankings. Northeastern leapfrogged 15 spots in the poll, from 142 to 127, placing right on the cusp of that all-important, mouth-watering second tier. What propelled us that far in one year? Was it the bricks? The new GNC near the Marino Center? West Village E?
In the end, it does not matter what jettisoned us up the rankings. They are terribly flawed and the attention they get around the Northeastern higher-ups is starting to teeter on the absurd. Even top universities are concerned with the clout these rankings hold. Read what former Stanford President Gerhard Casper wrote in a letter to the U.S. News back in 1996:
“I hope I have the standing to persuade you that much about these rankings — particularly their specious formulas and spurious precision — is utterly misleading,” Casper wrote. “I wish I could forego this letter since, after all, the rankings are only another newspaper story. Alas, alumni, foreign newspapers and many others do not bring a sense of perspective to the matter.”
The problems with the rankings are numerous. The peer assessment category is especially puzzling. Twenty-five percent of a school’s score depends on the feelings of other schools. This is like asking George Steinbrenner to grade the Red Sox. As Pepperdine professor, David Davenport, has noted, college and university presidents all over the country assess schools without knowing much about them.
Then there is the faculty factor that rates the faculty-student ratio, benefits, full time to part time and those with terminal degrees. Many students who attend prestigious schools can tell you that grad assistants or TAs teach half the classes for full timers. Also, judging the quality of professors by how well they are paid or what degrees they hold is purely superficial and often times misleading. One professor might be great for one student and awful for another.
The instability of the rankings is another murky area. Did the level of education so vastly improve at Northeastern that it jumped 15 spots in one year? This goes for any school. In the early 90s, Columbia went from 9 to 15 to 11. Harvard went from one to three and back to one. Schools are not opinion polls, writes Casper. They do not fluctuate so rapidly. Therefore, this movement is illogical. It does sell magazines. No one will continue to buy the yearly issue if the rankings remain static every year. So U.S. News shakes things up and alters their formulas on a yearly basis. Last year’s rankings were wrong! Our formulas were flawed! This year we’ve got it down pat! Until next year that is.
It all started in 1983, when U.S. News and World Report released its first rankings edition. The list consisted of only the opinions of university presidents. In 1988, the editors introduced a much more scientific process. Take a look at the criteria on the magazine’s Web site (usnews.com) and read the methodology section. You may need Stephen Hawking to sort through these convoluted formulas. However, these rankings only come out once a year. This way, you can forget about them after October unless, of course, you go to Northeastern, where you will be bombarded with our day-by-day progress in the rankings year-round.
When Northeastern was ranked number one in co-ops by the magazine, it was a big event. Just in case you missed the news, banners were placed throughout campus, articles were written, and pop-up ads were designed. NU officials stopped just short of tattooing it on their foreheads.
The rankings issue is a ploy to sell magazines. While it can be useful, it is taken far too seriously. Educator Paul Boyer, author of “College Rankings Exposed,” writes that among universities, “there is a tendency to focus on the superficial things that are measured by U.S. News.” He also notes that the rankings “seduce the nation with false assumptions that mislead parents and students, and manipulate the entire college admissions landscape.” The word that keeps coming up is “superficial.” There is no “best” college in America because everyone’s educational needs are different, therefore rendering these rankings inadequate.
Look at our humble university. SAT scores are up, more and more students are coming here from the mid-Atlantic region and the school is being much more selective. It is safe to say this has nothing to do with Northeastern advancing up the third tier. It has a lot to with word of mouth, effective advertising and the golden cow that is co-op.
Despite it all, the U.S. News and World Report college rankings guide has become Northeastern’s bible. It is preached to us as fervently as a priest preaches scripture on a Sunday morning. Except every day is Sunday here in the church of the top 100. At least it works out for the magazine. They have their own version of People magazine’s 50 Most Beautiful People issue. And it is just as superficial.
-Stephen Sears can be reached at [email protected]
