College Rankings & Ratings
College Rankings & Ratings
There are more than 4,000 colleges and universities in the United States, ranging from open-enrollment community colleges to highly selective Ivy League institutions, from colleges with historical missions to educate the underserved to universities exploring the cutting edge of online education.
So—which college is the best in the nation?
This conflict between acknowledging the full variety of colleges—each with its own role to play and students to serve—and attempting to identify which schools are most successful at leading their graduates to fulfilling lives and careers is the core challenge that any attempt to rank colleges and universities faces. Yet despite this considerable hurdle, in recent years the number of outlets offering college rankings lists has proliferated and is likely to continue to grow as federal and state governments release more data on postsecondary institutions. The rankings published by U.S. News & World Report were the first, arriving on newsstands in 1983. But since then, many other outlets have joined the fray, including Washington Monthly, Money magazine, The Economist, The New York Times’ Upshot, Forbes, and several others.
Indeed, in 2013 President Obama announced that the U.S. Department of Education would produce its own system for rating higher education institutions, though notably this proposed effort would only have given colleges a score, not rank them as the media lists do. But after nearly two years of discussions with college administrators and researchers, the department decided not to produce ratings, opting instead just to release more data about these institutions, including the average salary for students 10 years after they enrolled.
The department’s decision to abandon its ratings proposal, after facing criticism from many parts of the higher education community, demonstrates how challenging it can be to measure a college’s performance and the consequences that a particular rating or ranking could have for that institution. The federal agency originally sought to use the ratings as a tool for holding colleges more accountable, perhaps even tying an institution’s students’ eligibility to receive financial aid to how well the school performed by the Education Department’s measures. But, for example, if a college’s graduation rate becomes a key part of the rating, would two-year colleges or other institutions with high transfer rates receive unfavorable ratings?
Even though colleges and universities typically do not face any direct accountability for their ranking in the lists published by media outlets, these rankings are widely considered to have substantial impact on the ways some postsecondary institutions operate, as they seek more favorable rankings. From which types of students they seek to enroll to how they allocate their financial resources for faculty and campus development, administrators and trustees often have to consider how important a rise or fall on the list might be to the their institutions’ reputations and revenue.
Journalists should approach writing about college rankings and ratings with insight that goes beyond the rank or score a college received—and whether it’s up or down this year—to offer analysis on how and why the institution measured up that way in that particular list. The best way to achieve these deeper insights is to explore the data used to create the ranking. Most college rankings start with the data available publicly through the National Center for Education Statistics, the federal organization that collects and analyzes these numbers. There is a wealth of information available from this resource, but journalists should note that for each institution, the reported data are only for students who were first-time, full-time enrollees in college. This means that for institutions that enroll many adults who are returning to school (e.g. community colleges) or accept many transfer students (regional public universities), the NCES data might not be the most accurate representation of how well the college is serving its students. This note of caution is particularly relevant for the data regarding graduation and retention rates.
College rankings increasingly are using data that reflect the earning potential of students at each institution. In the fall of 2015, the College Scorecard the federal government produces for the first time added data for the average income for students at each college 10 years after they enrolled. These data are a boon for researchers, rankers, journalists, and—of course—students and families. It should be noted, however, that these data are for all students who enrolled that year, regardless of whether they graduated. For colleges in which many students drop out or transfer before earning a degree, the earnings number reported on the Scorecard is likely lower than it might be for actual graduates of that institution. These scorecard data also are for the institution overall, not program-by-program, so reporters should examine whether the college produces many graduates in science, engineering, or business disciplines, for instance, that might be tipping the scales.
Several state education departments do gather earnings data at the program level for colleges and universities in their borders. Check with your department to see whether it collects such data that you might use to cross-check what you see listed in rankings.
When reporting about rankings, also look to see whether the publisher gathers any proprietary data. For example, U.S. News & World Report each year commissions a survey of the top administrators of every college in an effort to measure each institution’s reputation. And, on the opposite end, the Princeton Review surveys more than 100,000 college students across the country each year to find the nation’s best party schools and least happy students.
Rutgers B-School Faked Jobs for Graduates to Inflate Its Rankings, Lawsuit Says
Rutgers University’s Business School inflated its rankings by creating fake jobs for its graduates, according to an accusation leveled in a whistle-blower lawsuit filed on Friday.
Deidre White, the business school’s human-resources manager, claims in her lawsuit that the university created bogus jobs to show that the school’s graduates had no trouble finding employment. But after she exposed the purported scheme and refused to comply with it, White asserts, she faced illegal harassment, discrimination, and retaliation.
75th EWA National Seminar
Orlando • July 24-26, 2022
Celebrating 75 Years!
As those in education and journalism work to recover from an extended pandemic, bringing together the community has never been more critical. The Education Writers Association’s 75th annual National Seminar will provide a long-awaited opportunity to gather in person for three days of training, networking, and inspiration.
Tips for Scrutinizing Data on College Value
Are college students getting the best education for their (and taxpayers’) money?
What’s the “value” of a college education? As college costs rise, more people are questioning what they’re getting for their tuition and tax money.
Reporters investigating this important topic can access a growing number of databases that are starting to capture at least some aspects of value, according to Dominique Baker, an education policy professor at Southern Methodist University, and Robert Kelchen, a professor at Seton Hall University and data manager for the Washington Monthly College Rankings.
74th EWA National Seminar
Virtual, May 2-5, 2021
The Education Writers Association’s 74th National Seminar will focus on the theme of “Now What? Reporting on Education Amid Uncertainty.” Four afternoons of conversations, training and presentations will give attendees deeper understanding of these crises, as well as tools, skills and context to help them better serve their communities — and advance their careers.
To be held May 2-5, 2021, the seminar will feature education newsmakers, including leaders, policy makers, researchers, practitioners and journalists. And it will offer practical data and other skills training.
A Different Kind of College Rankings
The Washington Monthly uses unique metrics to measure quality, including return on investment, strong outcomes for students of color, and effective civic engagement.
(EWA Radio: Episode 248)
When choosing a college, students and families often turn to popular rankings to help inform their decisions. Rather than focus on test scores and how difficult it is to gain entry, The Washington Monthly gives schools points for factors that benefit society as well as individual students, like upward mobility for low-income graduates and encouraging civic engagement on campus and after graduation.
73rd EWA National Seminar
EWA’s National Seminar is the largest annual gathering of journalists on the education beat.
This multi-day conference is designed to give participants the skills, understanding, and inspiration to improve their coverage of education at all levels. It also will deliver a lengthy list of story ideas. We will offer numerous sessions on important education issues, as well as on journalism skills.
72nd EWA National Seminar
Baltimore • May 6-8, 2019
EWA’s National Seminar is the largest annual gathering of journalists on the education beat. This year’s event in Baltimore, hosted by Johns Hopkins University’s School of Education, will explore an array of timely topics of interest to journalists from across the country, with a thematic focus on student success, safety, and well-being.
Come Together: How to Cover College Mergers
Small colleges struggling because of declining enrollment and tuition revenues face stark choices: If they can’t rebound, financial realities may force them to shut down.
Higher Education Seminar Fall 2018
Las Vegas • UNLV • September 24-25, 2018
The Education Writers Association will hold its 2018 Higher Education Seminar Sept. 24-25 on the campus of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
The theme of this year’s intensive training event for journalists will be “Navigating Rapid Change.” This journalist-only event will offer two days of high-impact learning opportunities. The seminar will focus on how both postsecondary education and journalism are adjusting to an increasingly divisive political environment, the decline of traditional revenue sources, and continuing technological innovations that are upending much of the economy.
Let’s Waste College on the Old
Opinion Journalism
About the Entry
Writing for The Washington Monthly, Paul Glastris argues that higher education would be well served by paying closer attention to the needs and interests of a growing demographic: adult students ages 25 and older.
Entry Credit
Public Universities Aren’t Tracking Student Suicides. That’s a Problem.
Student mental health efforts would benefit from more data, experts say (EWA Radio: Episode 154)
More than half of the nation’s 100 largest public universities fail to track student suicides, a surprising discovery revealed in a new investigation by the Associated Press’ Collin Binkley. Among the schools not keeping these statistics are Arizona State University and the University of Wisconsin, which have both had recent student suicides, Binkley reported.
71st EWA National Seminar
Los Angeles • May 16-18, 2018
EWA’s National Seminar is the largest annual gathering of journalists on the education beat. This multiday conference provides participants with top-notch training delivered through dozens of interactive sessions on covering education from early childhood through graduate school. Featuring prominent speakers, engaging campus visits, and plentiful networking opportunities, this must-attend conference provides participants with deeper understanding of the latest developments in education, a lengthy list of story ideas, and a toolbox of sharpened journalistic skills.
Lies, Damn Lies and College Affordability Statistics
Everybody says college is expensive. But exactly how costly are the colleges you cover? At 1 p.m. EST on Dec. 14, journalists participated in a free one-hour training webinar on two new and as-yet little-known data tools. They learned ways to quickly find the most reliable and relevant data on costs, prices and affordability.
Attendees had the opportunity to hear from – and pose questions to – two of the most knowledgeable college cost data experts in the country.
How Georgia State Dramatically Changed Its Graduation Rate (and How Other Universities Can, Too)
In 2006, Georgia State University had a problem. The graduation rate was an abysmal 41 percent. And in many cases, the dropouts were seniors who just needed a few credits more to earn their bachelor’s degree.
Unlike many other colleges struggling with high dropout rates, Georgia State took (in many cases, expensive) actions that seem to have actually worked. Today, 53 percent of their freshmen graduate within six years.
Why Public Research Universities Are Struggling
Higher education enrollment downturns, federal funding predictions, and how U.S. global competitiveness could be at risk.
For a growing number of public universities, particularly in the midwest, what was once a push for academic excellence is now more like a battle for survival, as detailed by The Hechinger Report’s Jon Marcus in a new piece for Washington Monthly. What happened? Enrollment drops, funding cuts and shifting public attitudes toward higher education.
Higher Ed 2017: Covering Campus Conflict in the Time of Trump
Atlanta • October 2–3, 2017
From heated debates over free speech to the Trump administration’s threats to deport undocumented students, these are tense times on college campuses. For reporters who cover higher education, questions abound and important stories need to be told.
On Oct. 2-3, EWA will bring together journalists at Georgia State University in Atlanta to explore pressing issues in education after high school. (Here’s the preliminary agenda.) At this journalist-only seminar you will hear:
Some Universities See Drop in International Applicants
College officials point to 'Trump effect'
For the first time since the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, some top universities are seeing their international student application numbers slide.
Study Shows Sharp Drop in Republican Support for Higher Ed
Views toward higher education have become increasingly more partisan over the past couple of years, a new survey by the Pew Research Center shows.
The national survey, conducted in early June among 2,504 adults, showed that 58 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents believe colleges have a negative effect on the country, compared to 19 percent for Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents.
New Poll Finds Adults Have Second Thoughts About Their College Experiences
During a graduation season when congratulations are the usual fare, regret instead was the main course during an Education Writers Association seminar session about higher education polling. The potentially lucrative major discarded or the campus that could have become your beloved alma mater but didn’t: These were the emotional subjects tackled, backed with research methods of opinion surveys.
How Latino Parents Judge School Quality
So how do Latino parents judge the quality of their child’s school? The good old-fashioned way: by reviewing their child’s report card.
A recent poll conducted by the Leadership Conference Fund, a nonprofit civil rights group based in Washington, D.C., found that 86 percent of Latino families said their child’s report card topped the list in judging school quality.
Goodbye, High School Transcripts?
EWA Radio: Episode 122
Scott Jaschik of Inside Higher Ed discusses a proposal by a coalition of elite private schools to abolish the traditional letter-grade high school transcript. Instead, the coalition touts a new approach that it argues would give colleges a more in-depth look at what applicants know and are able to do.
10 Things You Should Know About Earnings After College
Go to college, get a better job. That’s the message at the heart of the nation’s ongoing efforts to encourage a wider array of students to attain degrees. But college’s effects on graduates’ earnings is complex, varied and often misunderstood. While a bachelor’s degree clearly matters, where and what a student studies can be just as important as whether the student graduates with a degree at all.
New Poll: College Grads Unhappy With the Career Services They’re Getting
More than half say their career offices were unhelpful or only somewhat helpful
Universities and colleges may be seen as gateways to good jobs, but many don’t pass the test on providing students useful career advice, according to a new poll.
More than half of college graduates say the career services offices of their alma maters were unhelpful or only somewhat helpful, compared to 43 percent who say the offices were helpful or very helpful, the Gallup-Purdue Index shows.
Public Universities Have ‘Really Lost Our Focus’
Q&A with Christopher Newfield
Since the 1970s, a “doom loop” has pervaded higher education, writes Christopher Newfield in his new book The Great Mistake: How We Wrecked Public Universities and How We Can Fix Them. Newfield, a professor of American Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, calls this loop “privatization” – the hidden and overt ways that “business practices restructure teaching and research.”
How Will Education Fare Under President Trump?
The long, strange election cycle came to an end Tuesday with the election of Donald Trump as the next president. And while his campaign platform was scarce on education policy details, there’s no question his administration will have a significant impact, from early childhood to K-12 and higher education.
Doing More With Higher Ed Data: From Policy to Newsrooms
Philadelphia • February 2–3, 2017
With colleges and universities under increased pressure to ensure that more students earn degrees without amassing mountains of debt, journalists are at the forefront in examining how these institutions measure up. But there’s one major obstacle that both colleges and reporters share when it comes to making sense of how well these schools are meeting their goals: insufficient data.
¡Gradúate! 2.0: White House Releases Graduation Guide Aimed at Hispanics
In what the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics is calling a “culturally relevant” resource guide, Latino students and their families could find all they need to know about preparing, applying, paying for and succeeding in college.
Finding Stories in College Scorecard Data
Webinar recap.
The best data are often the hardest to parse. Sure, a neat snapshot of three or four variables is easy on the eyes, but to really dig deep and find important and surprising trends, you’ll probably have to wade through dozens of variables.
Or in the College Scorecard’s case, 2,000 variables.
Know the Score: Finding Stories in College Scorecard Data
How many first-generation students does a college have? How much does the school charge students from families earning $30,000 versus more than $75,000? And how many students are repaying their student loan debt three years after college?
Proposed Student Finance Regulations May Hamper Small Institutions
The Brookings Institution
In June, the U.S. Department of Education released a 530-page set of proposed regulations on the topic of ‘defense to repayment.’ Although this sounds like an obscure topic (and reading the document is no picnic!), these proposed rules, if adopted, could allow students to be able to have their student loan debt forgiven if colleges misrepresented themselves to students. The Department of Education is currently working through this process forformer Corinthian Colleges students, and tens of thousands more students could be eligible under the proposed rules.
Bang For Your Buck: Money Magazine’s College Rankings
EWA Radio: Episode 81
Unlike some other college ranking formulas, Money on the return on investment: how big a boost is a degree from a particular school when it comes to landing top-tier jobs after graduation?
Back-to-School: You Need Stories, We’ve Got Ideas
For education reporters, coming up with fresh ideas for back-to-school stories is an annual ritual. And if you’re balancing the K-12 and higher education beats, it can be an even bigger challenge.
Election 2016: New President, New Education Agenda
Washington, D.C. • November 14, 2016
The election of Republican Donald Trump is sure to reshape federal policy for education in significant ways, from prekindergarten to college, especially coupled with the GOP’s retaining control of Congress.
Although Trump spent relatively little time on education in his campaign, he did highlight the issue from time to time, from his sharp criticism of the Common Core and high student debt loads to proposing a plan to significantly expand school choice. And Congress has a long to-do list, including reauthorization of the Higher Education Act.
Higher Education and the 2016 Presidential Election
The first total solar eclipse to sweep across the entire continental United States in 38 years will occur on August 21, 2017. Don’t expect reauthorization of the Higher Education Act (HEA) anytime before then.
The HEA expired at the end of 2013 and it’s likely nothing will happen with it in an election year or soon thereafter, agreed a panel of journalists discussing key higher education issues and the 2016 presidential election, at the Education Writers Association National Seminar in Boston in May.
Competitive College Admissions: Too Much Hype?
Are education reporters unwittingly contributing to the hysteria over elite college admissions? What do policymakers say needs to be done to ramp down the tension without dimming enthusiasm among students? And how did the perception of college admissions as inaccessible to most — when the reverse is actually more accurate — become so pervasive?
The Dispute Over Whether Good Colleges Help or Hurt Average Students
According to a leading economist, the public debate over affirmative action’s role in higher education is missing the point, and could actually lead to worse academic outcomes for students who get a boost from a college’s affirmative action policies. That view, however, is hotly contested by a wide range of scholars.
Does the College Admissions Game Need New Rules?
EWA Radio: Episode 56
A new report from a coalition of educators suggests it’s time to rein in ambitious students (and their families) when it comes applying to the nation’s top colleges and universities.
Higher Ed 2016
September 16–17 • Tempe, Arizona
What new techniques and practices should higher education embrace to ensure that more students graduate? Join the Education Writers Association September 16–17 at Arizona State University to explore cutting-edge innovations that aim to address financial, academic, and social barriers. More on the seminar theme.
This annual seminar is one of the largest gatherings of journalists covering postsecondary education. Network with others covering this beat and step up your coverage for the upcoming academic year.
Tempe, Arizona
EWA Radio: Here Are Your Favorites of 2015
It’s been a terrific year for our scrappy little podcast, and we’re thrilled to report an equally stellar lineup coming to EWA Radio in 2016.
I’d like to take a moment to thank the many journalists and education experts who made time to join us for lively conversations, and to all of you who have offered suggestions for stories and guests to feature. Please keep the feedback coming!
Here’s a quick rundown of the 10 most popular episodes of the year:
Four Thoughts About New Education Department College Reforms
The Obama administration is giving a late-game push to its higher education initiatives this fall, rolling out a flurry of new accountability measures aimed at helping students and families make more informed choices when it comes to choosing colleges.
Ten Higher Ed Story Ideas for 2015-2016 (Plus One Bonus)
In a word, perspective.
Getting Beyond Ratings and Rankings to Find What Works for Minority-Serving Institutions
Paul Quinn College President Michael Sorrell knows his campus won’t be rated highly by the U.S. Department of Education’s new College Scorecard. In fact, Paul Quinn has “the worst numbers you can possibly imagine at the federal level,” Sorrell told reporters at EWA’s recent higher education conference Sept. 18-19 in Orlando.
Washington Monthly’s 2015 College Rankings
EWA Radio: Episode 36
The Washington Monthly’s new college rankings are out, and this year’s top performers are an eclectic mix of publicly funded institutions, innovative upstarts, and a handful of familiar Ivy League names.
Money Magazine’s College Rankings Examine How Much ‘Value’ Students Get
The folks at Money magazine are largely doing the work the White House sought to do but hasn’t: rate colleges and universities by the extra boost they give students in landing financially rewarding careers.
Released this week, Money’s rating system ranks more than 700 schools according to an in-house rubric for measuring how much value a college offers students given its price of attendance.
After Pushback, White House Yields on College Ratings
EWA Radio: Episode 28
After nearly two years of public debate, and vociferous pushback from the higher education community, the White House announced it is pulling back on plans to rate the nation’s colleges based on a complex matrix of performance measures and student outcomes. Paul Fain, news editor for Inside Higher Ed has been following this story closely since the beginning, and he helped break the news that the Obama administration was scrapping the most controversial parts of its original proposal.
He spoke with EWA public editor Emily Richmond about who’s surprised by the decision (hint: not a lot of people), and the role played by aggressive lobbying against the rating plan by much of the higher education community. Fain and Richmond also discussed college ratings and consumer tools already available, and how to answer parents and students who ask for advice on choosing a school.
Social Media Giant Jumps at the College Rankings Game
If you’re into numbers, you may want to consider the University of Pennsylvania over Yale. Computers? Try Stanford. If the media is your desired career path, New York, Hofstra and Duke universities should be on your list.
Follow-Up Friday: College Rankings, ‘Education At a Glance,’ and Stephen King
U.S.News & World Report published its annual higher education rankings this week, and the New York Times also offered its first-ever roundup of colleges that have demonstrated a commitment toward low-income students.
Experts: The White House Plan to Rate Colleges Has Major Issues
A new rating system backed by the White House aims to evaluate nearly all of the nation’s colleges and universities. Roughly 6,000 schools that educate around 22 million students are about to endure an unprecedented amount of federal scrutiny.
And though a version of the Postsecondary Institution Ratings System is scheduled to be unveiled in the fall, policy watchers are still unsure of what’s in store.
Follow-Up Friday: Catch Up with EWA Radio
It’s been a busy couple of weeks for EWA Radio, the podcast I co-host with my EWA colleague Mikhail Zinshteyn. In case you missed the most recent episodes, you can catch the replays. (I’ve been told we make a fine accompaniment to walking the dog, moderate-paced elliptical trainer activity and even the occasional lunchtime Greek yogurt consumption.)
Money Magazine Ranks Colleges’ ROI
EWA Radio, Episode 11
EWA’s Emily Richmond and Mikhail Zinshteyn speak with Money Magazine education reporter Kim Clark about the publication’s first-ever college rankings, which focus on the return-on-investment factor of earning a degree from a particular institution.