U.S. News & World Report unleashed its 13th annual list of college rankings last week, with all the fanfare of a coronation. Within hours, eager university flacks, brochure-makers, and regional newspapers had assessed the numbers, looking for a positive spin.
"Yale ranks third again," a smug headline announced in the Yale Daily News, seemingly miffed that the school still fell behind Princeton and Harvard. "UC schools high on list of top public universities," trumpeted a more upbeat headline in the San Francisco Chronicle, omitting the fact that public universities, in general, hadn't fared so well on U.S. News' closely watched national list. (UC Berkeley did, however, snag the coveted first place spot on the site's list of public universities.)
The underlying question for analysts, though, isn't where each school landed, but why we even care. U.S. News is, after all, the old Olympian that comes down each year to cast judgment, usually on factors that matter to institutions (academic reputation, faculty resources) but not on issues that matter to students (affordability, debt, job prospects after graduation). The rankings are widely regarded as a form of gamesmanship among Ivy League schools: Those that can draw elite students and afford superstar faculty hover at the top, whereas those that serve lower- and middle-income populations are seldom mentioned.
To Amy Laitinen, deputy director for higher education at the D.C.-based think tank the New America Foundation, college rankings aren't just an anachronism, they're a poison. They've helped fuel an arms race for amenities, she says, encouraging schools to add rock climbing walls, four-star dining halls, and swanky dorms that help market the college experience, but do little for educational quality. Students who pay for these frills might wind up with nothing more than "a big promissory note and maybe a good frat or sorority experience."
That focus on wealth and exclusivity trickles down from the Ivy League glitterati to their public university counterparts; UC Berkeley isn't Harvard or Stanford or Yale, but it's starting to look more and more like an elite school. And that's reflected in the sticker price: In-state tuition costs $12,972 this year, up from $1,640 in 1990, and $509 in 1970.
"We don't believe price is a determinant of which schools are better at academic quality," U.S. News data czar Bob Morse explains, adding that for many prospective students, price is no object: Stanford's $44,757 annual tuition might be worth it, given the school's fourth-place rank.
Still, some disillusioned publications have begun posting their own ratings systems based on other factors. The one in Washington Monthly looks at whether schools are contributing to the public good. U.S. News might be the main arbiter for now, but it exists in a PR echo chamber. It'll eventually get supplanted.
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