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Criticism of college and university rankings (North America)


Criticism of college and university rankings refers to movements which developed among faculty and administrators in American Institutions of Higher Education as well as in Canada. The arguments of those who criticize the ranking are that it is not possible to come with a single number that characterizes university performance. Furthermore, ratings can be easily manipulated and include such subjective characteristics as the “reputation” determined by surveying university administrators such as chancellors or deans. In addition, the methodology of many rankings (e.g., U.S. News & World Report 2015 Best Engineering Schools Rankings) emphasizes research expenditures (such as grants and contracts) as the only measure of scientific accomplishments despite the concern that measuring science by the amount of money spent rather than by the importance and impact of scientific discoveries or the depth of the ideas could encourage costly projects that are not necessary scientifically sound.

In 1995, Reed College refused to participate in U.S. News & World Report annual survey. According to Reed's Office of Admissions, "Reed College has actively questioned the methodology and usefulness of college rankings ever since the magazine's best-colleges list first appeared in 1983, despite the fact that the issue ranked Reed among the top ten national liberal arts colleges. Reed's concern intensified with disclosures in 1994 by the Wall Street Journal about institutions flagrantly manipulating data in order to move up in the rankings in U.S. News and other popular college guides. This led Reed's then-president Steven Koblik to inform the editors of U.S. News that he didn't find their project credible, and that the college would not be returning any of their surveys."

Rolling Stone, in its 16 October 1997 issue, argued that Reed's rankings were artificially decreased by U.S. News after they stopped sending data to U.S. News & World Report. Reed has also made the same claim. In discussing Reed's decision, President Colin Diver wrote in an article for the November 2005 issue of the Atlantic Monthly, "by far the most important consequence of sitting out the rankings game, however, is the freedom to pursue our own educational philosophy, not that of some newsmagazine."


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