Below is a letter I wrote as part of an assignment in the UC-Irvine College Consulting Certificate program. We were instructed to write a letter to a family who was concerned that their child’s choice of college, Auburn, was not more highly ranked in US New & World Report.
Dear Parents,
Congratulations on your child’s acceptance to Auburn University! I’m so proud!
I understand you have some concerns about Auburn’s ranking not being in the top 75 in the US News 2024 Best College Rankings. I’d like to give you my thoughts on rankings and why they are not all they seem.
Surveys are given to university officials to peer review other universities and these are weighted at more than 20% (the largest portion of the USNWR methodology). Surveys are matters of opinion and according to a Georgia Tech admissions blog, only 20-40% of these surveys are returned. Therefore ⅕ of the methodology stats comes from less than half those surveyed. I don’t find this to be reliable data. Another faulty measurement comes from Faculty Resources (20%). Much like school districts may say they have a 15:1 student teacher ratio, universities can claim to have smaller class sizes as part of Faculty Resources. Anyone who has spent time in a school knows that the 15:1 ratio comes from including all staff members in the school to create this stat while the actual classroom has 20-25 students per teacher. It’s similar with universities, schools hire more adjunct professors to teach classes which skews the stats. A final reason and biggest reason why I am not a believer in college rankings is because the ranking of selectivity at 12% for the methodology should be several points less. What makes a university selective is the percent of acceptance letters to applications submitted. This is a bogus number because many, many schools are spending millions of marketing dollars to lure non-qualified students to apply. For example, my own daughters received more mail from the #12 school on the list than from any other university during their junior year of high school. My daughters did not fit the student profile for this school because their test scores were not even close in range. Schools like this are begging students to apply so they can reject them. The more students you reject, the more selective you are and that gets you 12% on the methodology.
Let’s take a fresh look at Auburn so you can reevaluate. I like to use the US Department of Education College Scorecard for as accurate statistics as possible. Auburn’s graduation rate is 78% which is 20 points higher than the average school and median earnings are almost $11,000 higher than average. The median debt at graduation is only $21,000. Another website I like to use for stats is College Confidential. I have also found it to be valuable for information beyond the stats such as campus culture, academics, and I really like that it is very user-friendly. We can see the acceptance rate is 44% and The Princeton Review ranked it as the #1 Happiest Campus. That is a stat I would like to believe! It is notable that Auburn is a Land, Sea, and Space Grant university which gives it access to federal funds for research, training, and programs in these areas.
If you are still concerned about your child’s choice not being in the top 75, consider that this is only 3% of the 2,600+ universities in the US. Auburn is ranked 93 on the list which is in the top 3.5%. I hope this allows you some perspective on the rankings and gives you a broader-view of the college landscape.
Thank you and please let me know if you would like me to point you to more resources.
Jennifer Mayo