In the monotheistic world of college admissions, one deity—the “U.S. News & World Report”—lays down its commandments to petrified high school students looking for the perfect fit. As one of the most selective schools in the nation, Wesleyan University has always guarded an enviable spot in the Liberal Arts College portion of the U.S. News rankings.
“Wesleyan has been at about the same place near the top of the rankings among what most folks think of as similar schools for many years,” said Greg Pyke, Senior Associate Dean of Admission.
For over 20 years, the “U.S. News & World Report” has come out with an annual list of college rankings that for the application frenzy to come.
However, for the past three years, the University’s rank has slowly slid away from the coveted top 10, landing uncomfortably in the teens. In 2007, Wesleyan slipped from the tenth to the eleventh slot, and this year coasted to a spot at 13, just under Claremont McKenna College and Vassar College.
The effects this downgrade will have on the University are hard to predict.
“Who uses the rankings and how is far from clear and consistent,” Pyke said. “For some students—International students, for example—rankings no doubt play a more important roll.”
Within the past several years, the admissions process at most colleges has become increasingly competitive. As a result, the University’s migration away from the top 10 could have real consequences. Though students, parents, guidance counselors and many colleges use the U.S. News rankings religiously, few understand how the lists are compiled.
“I think they [make the rankings] just based on prestige, like name recognition,” said Abdul Abdulla ’12, who made use of the U.S. News reports in his college search last year.
The U.S. News says that it uses a number of weighted categories and statistics to calculate an overall rating for each individual school. These categories include retention, faculty resources, student selectivity, financial resources, graduation rate performance and alumni giving rate.
One of the most heavily weighted categories—adding up to 25% of the final ranking—is “peer assessment,” which asks college administrators to rate other schools. However, according to U.S. News, only 46 percent of those administrators polled—out of a total of 4,242 who received questionnaires—even bothered to respond. Such a low survey return-rate points to a larger trend that has swept across college campuses.
For the past five years, much of the academic community has been increasingly vocal in its opposition to the U.S. News system, arguing that a rigid numbers-based approach to rankings is not the most productive or effective way to illustrate what colleges have to offer.
Indeed, in July of 2007, the majority of the members of the Annapolis Group, an assembly of eighty college presidents and seventy-one academic deans, voted against participating in the U.S. News ranking exercise, according to collegenews.org.
Though President Michael Roth did not join in on this vote of no confidence, the increasingly polarizing debate has forced the University to take a critical look at the U.S. News system.
“Rankings are a reality of today’s college admission landscape, even though they tell us little about a student’s experience,” Roth said. “We do review them carefully and will study whatever insight they provide.”
While the University has not yet committed to a position on the rankings system, the administration has taken steps to distance its admissions material from the influence of the U.S. News.
“Students choose Wes [because they] recognize that we provide the educational environment that will enable them to discover their passions and to make them productive,” Roth said.
The image of prospective University students as headstrong and independent seems to determine the school’s philosophy when it comes to admissions rhetoric.
“We do not cite magazine rankings in Wesleyan Admission publications,” said Pyke. “Students who choose Wesleyan tend to be independent thinkers, so they wouldn’t be led around by rankings, right?”
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