Noodle Staff

Noodle Expert Member

September 04, 2019

Publications use all kinds of measures to rank universities and many of them don't overlap. So what do those scores really mean? We decided to take a look behind the rankings....

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Each fall, a variety of publications release their lists of school rankings.

The most ubiquitous of which comes from U.S. News & World Report. So why is Harvard University #1 according to U.S. News, while Forbes thinks it's Williams College and Washington Monthly claims U.C. San Diego is the best in the land?

School size and type aside, publications use different measures of quality when assigning rankings. Furthermore, publications may use the same measure (for example, retention rates) but value them in different ways (e.g. 15% at U.S. News but 6% at Forbes) when assigning ratings.

The most common measures used for school rankings in 2011 were test scores, retention/graduation rates and the student/faculty ratio. And the similarities pretty much end there. Publications use all kinds of measures and many of them don't overlap. So who does what? We decided to take a look behind the rankings...

Today's School Rankings: Kiplinger

# Who It's For

Students who want the best academic quality at a lower price

# What They Look At

Total Expenses to Student

Average cost for students with or without need (subtracting grants)

Average Percent of need met by financial aid

Average amount of debt per student before graduation

# Pros:

Their interactive table allows some level of custom ranking. You can adjust the listings according to in or out-of-state costs, average debt at graduation or admission rates. You can also filter your lists by state.

# Cons:

Although Kiplinger does an excellent job of taking into account both academic and economic factors, most of thier academic evaluations rely on measures such as admission rates and standardized test scores.