Forbes Ranks the Colleges
Yesterday, Forbes came out with its second annual college rankings. It was immediately one of the top search items in the news. I can understand why people get all excited about rankings - it's great to feel like you know which school will give you the best education, the best value (or even the best party).
The problem is that picking colleges isn't that simple. One student might get his best education at Oberlin, while another might get hers at UCLA. Each school offers a different social and academic environment, and rankings don't allow those nuances to shine through.
Additionally, Forbes uses pretty questionable methodology when it comes to creating their list. Here's how they tabulate the rankings:
25% is based on scores from RateMyProfessors.com, a website that provides student rankings of professors. In addition to being a veritable popularity contest, the site doesn't moderate its rankings. That means a professor could even rate himself – as many times as he wanted to.
25% is based on average alumni salaries and how many alumni are in Who's Who in America. Even Forbes (evidenced by this article), thinks Who's Who is more of a marketing ploy than an actual list of notable business people. Alumni salaries are also variable based on region. For example, Michigan alumni are more likely to live in the Midwest, therefore more likely to have a lower cost of living than, say, Berkeley alums, and therefore more likely to have lower salaries.
The last 50% is made up of a combination of the amount of student debt, percentage of students graduating in four years, and the number of students/professors who have won "nationally competitive awards" like the Rhodes Scholarship. While I still don't think these are necessarily quantifiers of a good school, this at least makes some logical sense.
So, here are the rankings. Just make sure to take these rankings (and all others) with a grain (or a shaker) of salt.
