Boston University came up short once again in nearly all U.S. News ‘ World Report graduate school rankings this year, placing out of the top 50 in the magazine’s business school and education school categories.
The report, which ranks the 50 best United States graduate schools in several categories, placed the BU School of Law at 28th, tied with the College of William and Mary and the University of Notre Dame; the BU School of Medicine at 40th, tied with Wake Forest University and the University of Maryland; and the BU School of Engineering at 50th. The School of Management and School of Education graduate schools did not make their respective lists at all.
Harvard University ranks first in the magazine’s business school, education school and research medical school categories, while the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ranks first in engineering schools and Yale University has the top-ranked law school.
The magazine’s yearly report is compiled by sending out questionnaires to various deans and program directors at a number of universities in the United States, magazine officials said. Deans are asked to rate the academic standing of schools in their areas.
Along with the deans’ responses, U.S. News ‘ World Report collects variable statistical data from the schools, like quality of faculty and students and level of research.
More specific data is gathered for specific schools. For law schools, for example, LSAT scores, admission rates, rate of employment after graduation and number of students passing the bar exam are a few of the numbers used, magazine officials said.
With the deans’ ratings and statistical data, schools get ‘a weight,’ according to Robert Morse of U.S. News, who compiled the ratings. The school with the highest score is given 100 points and all other schools are represented as a percentage of that.
The complicated process used to calculate the rankings is why U.S. News feels that its work is legitimate.
‘[U.S. News] is for the benefit of students and not to make the college look good,’ said magazine spokesman Richard Folkers.
He said it is common for people to call the magazine’s questions ‘silly,’ but a lot of work is put into the surveys.
‘Since we started in 1990, we meet with deans to update the survey,’ he said. ‘No one’s really come up with anything better.’
But SED dean Douglas Sears said he does not place much credence in the rankings.
‘Our students performed fine,’ Sears said. ‘We have among the highest admission standards here at BU. [U.S. News] is just an unscholarly survey it has no legitimacy to it.’
SMG dean Louis Lataif also said the ratings are not good enough. He said he was not surprised SMG was not in the top ratings.
‘This is not new news we’re never in the ratings,’ he said.
Like Sears, Lataif said the survey creates a perception that is detached from reality, and BU is stuck in the ‘reputational lag,’ where it is trying to catch up with the perception created by such surveys.
The London Financial Times sent an accounting firm to calculate the rankings of the best management schools in the area, Lataif said, and SMG was ranked 44th.
‘Most thoughtful people realize that this is about selling magazines,’ Lataif said. ‘It’s all highly subjective.’
According to the deans, the categories U.S. News uses to rank schools are unrealistic and irrelevant.
BU spokesman Colin Riley said the survey judges the quality of a school’s faculty by whether they have PhDs, not their experience. He said such standards are irrelevant, for example, for professors in the College of Communication, where practical experience matters more.
‘Who would you prefer someone who has worked for the finest institutions or someone with a PhD?’ Riley said.
He also said BU does not provide any statistical information to U.S. News. But he said that does not matter. The top schools on the list will always remain the same, he contended.
‘Even if we’re the number one undergraduate school next year, I’d say take it with a grain of salt,’ he said.
Sears said in ranking education schools, higher weight is given to schools with larger research grants and funding, which is not one of SED’s fortes. But Sears said testing standards, school reform and the internal structure of the school are strong.
‘We don’t have a lot of money,’ he said. ‘That is not a measure of quality of education schools. If you look at how our young people do on our tests, SATs, credentials of our entering graduate students, it’s very good.’
But according to Morse, research is an important part of graduate school.
‘We are taking the premise that the more research is being conducted, the better,’ he said. ‘If the school is not conducting any research, in our view and the view of academics, they are not a good grad school.’
Abuse of the rankings comes into play when students use them as a last word on college selection, Lataif said.
He said most serious students do more research, like visiting the school, reading alumni and faculty work and seeing course outlines. But for the few who don’t do that, ‘we may miss them,’ Lataif said.
According to Folkers, though, the point of the survey is not to be the final word on college decisions.
‘[U.S. News is] a significant tool for choosing school, but very far from being the only one,’ Folkers said.
According to Morse, the survey provides students with useful information that they do not have access to on their own. He said students are expected to consider price, location and other standards before making their decision.
‘If [students] are taking the ranking, saying ‘I will only go to grad school if I can get into the top 20 otherwise I won’t go,’ then that’s not the way,’ he said.
But Sears said such surveys are a ‘source of disinformation’ for potential students.
‘It’s a betrayal of public trust to do things that don’t work for the good of children,’ he said.
Sears said that a better way to judge a school would be to observe the work done by students and faculty, see the structure of the school and examine the content of the course material.