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How Reliable Are University Rankings?

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Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#31

Post by heyn05tradamu5 »

skat20phys wrote: post #27

Sometime not too long ago there was a blog post or article covered on HN, about data showing student scores on some academic achievement measure over time. If I remember, all students generally improved on this measure throughout undergrad, and there was some average tendency for universities with higher average entering standardized test scores to have higher scores, but the effect seemed to be mostly driven by the…

Interesting. I wonder how one would measure whether an institution changes student trajectories? Or if that data is available somewhere.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#32

Post by cpsempek »

jedberg wrote: post #23
HenryKissinger wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The fact that it's easily game-able also makes it more attractive to universities because they can do something proactive if they're dissatisfied with their ranking Are you saying that there is nothing lower ranked universities could do to improve their ranking in a better, more objective ranking of universities? Because it smacks of elitism.

It's very similar to sports teams. The tops teams don't vary all that much from year to year. They might change positions a bit, but it's rare for a new team to show up who hasn't shown up before. They essentially have to get lucky and get someone who is super talented into a long term contract, who then attracts additional talent. Or they have to invent a whole new way of doing things, like how the Oakland A's inven…

Unsure of the exact metric you're referring to, and I'm about to be just as informal, but sports teams swing much more wildly and often than universities. In the NBA, most recently GSW, going from 5 straight finals with 3 wins to last in western conference. See also CHI before and after MJ era. LAL most recently after Kobe's retirement and pre-Lebron. In the NFL, SF post-Young pre-Harbaugh. I agree, there are often dynasties and teams can sit in the tops ranks for quite a while, however it is not at all uncommon to see once top ranked teams vying for lottery draft picks. Maybe the over-all mix does not churn that much, but I can't recall the last time a top 10 school dropped out of the top 100 without a scandal involved.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#33

Post by [deleted] »

barry-cotter wrote: post #21
spideymans wrote: post #4

Why is there such a fixation on university rankings in the United States? Postsecondary rankings don't seem to matter as much in other Western countries.

Not true of the UK, France, Korea or Japan. I don’t know if they care about what are basically league tables but any educated citizen would find it no more difficult to reel off five to ten of their best universities than an American would to list Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, MIT etc. I can see how it would look weird from a German, or possibly a Dutch or Nordic perspective but a deliberate effort to bring up…

[deleted]

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#34

Post by jedberg »

cpsempek wrote: post #32
jedberg wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's very similar to sports teams. The tops teams don't vary all that much from year to year. They might change positions a bit, but it's rare for a new team to show up who hasn't shown up before. They essentially have to get lucky and get someone who is super talented into a long term contract, who then attracts additional talent. Or they have to invent a whole new way of doing things, like how the Oakland A's inven…

Unsure of the exact metric you're referring to, and I'm about to be just as informal, but sports teams swing much more wildly and often than universities. In the NBA, most recently GSW, going from 5 straight finals with 3 wins to last in western conference. See also CHI before and after MJ era. LAL most recently after Kobe's retirement and pre-Lebron. In the NFL, SF post-Young pre-Harbaugh. I agree, there are often d…

I would say sports just moves faster than academics. The average sports career is only a few years with a few exceptions, the average academic career is much longer.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#36

Post by ijidak »

plorkyeran wrote: post #19
spideymans wrote: post #4

Why is there such a fixation on university rankings in the United States? Postsecondary rankings don't seem to matter as much in other Western countries.

Is there actually a big fixation on university rankings? I had no idea what my school's ranking was (apparently it's now #40) and I'm not sure I've ever had conversation where university rankings came up outside of specifically talking about where a high school student is thinking about applying. Even then it's not like it's common for people to pick which school to go to out of the ones that accepted them based sole…

The rankings mattered to me when applying to schools because it seemed like a useful metric to judge the quality of education I would get, and the usability of that education.

When you're making one of the biggest decisions of your life, rankings can help you know how good your choices are.

Not saying rankings are correct...

But for those applying, they likely appreciate having a ranking mechanism.

It's one of the few objective measures of universities available.

How do you know, otherwise, if this university that wants to charge you $40,000 per year is really going to deliver on their promise?

You can't just go back to school again and start over.

It's a life decision, so there is a desperate desire for the applying student to have an objective way of stack ranking the choices.

(Disclosure: I attended MIT. And I basically just applied to the top 5 or 10 computer science universities -- again, using rankings. And hoped to get into one of those.)

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#37

Post by Consultant32452 »

spideymans wrote: post #4

Why is there such a fixation on university rankings in the United States? Postsecondary rankings don't seem to matter as much in other Western countries.

As a general rule, you aren't allowed admittance into the Cathedral unless you've demonstrated proper indoctrination at the most "prestigious" universities.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#38

Post by AtlasBarfed »

plorkyeran wrote: post #19
spideymans wrote: post #4

Why is there such a fixation on university rankings in the United States? Postsecondary rankings don't seem to matter as much in other Western countries.

Is there actually a big fixation on university rankings? I had no idea what my school's ranking was (apparently it's now #40) and I'm not sure I've ever had conversation where university rankings came up outside of specifically talking about where a high school student is thinking about applying. Even then it's not like it's common for people to pick which school to go to out of the ones that accepted them based sole…

If you dropped 200k-300k on an education, you'll be invested in either the continued value or and improvement in your investment's reputation, which as the years go on is really its only value.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#39

Post by ghaff »

jedberg wrote: post #34
cpsempek wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unsure of the exact metric you're referring to, and I'm about to be just as informal, but sports teams swing much more wildly and often than universities. In the NBA, most recently GSW, going from 5 straight finals with 3 wins to last in western conference. See also CHI before and after MJ era. LAL most recently after Kobe's retirement and pre-Lebron. In the NFL, SF post-Young pre-Harbaugh. I agree, there are often d…

I would say sports just moves faster than academics. The average sports career is only a few years with a few exceptions, the average academic career is much longer.

That's true and, furthermore, a big part of why a university is well-ranked in year N boils down to it being well-ranked in year N-1 and N-2. With a sports team, if you have some critical injuries or otherwise lose important personnel from the prior year or two, no one cares that you won the championship a couple years back if you have a mediocre record this year. There's just a lot more inertia in university rankings both on objective factors and on things that basically depend on being a good university because they're a good university.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#40

Post by tyingq »

There is a very current thing happening where individual professors have too much power. The whole "remote teaching" thing is VERY new for some universities and professors. My son recently survived a final where > 90% of the class failed. Mostly due to poor execution of remote learning. Including simple stuff like classes overlapping meeting times, study material uploaded too late, etc.

No pressure on the professor or university, though. All on the students. There's a rant letter, from the prof, about effort where effort wasn't a factor. My kid survived solely because he has a very good memory. No accountability. I AM PISSED.

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