Rankings

[secretly_yes]

Hi,

I am not sure if you have already had the chance to check this out, but this website gives you the option of sorting and ranking programs according to whatever criteria you choose.

I really liked it because it helped me compare schools based on only the factors that are important to me (research productivity, student placement, time to degree) and disregard some that I am not so concerned about (first year funding, insurance, diversity).

Maybe it will help someone else too.

[bees]

NRC rankings here: http://sites.nationalacademies.org/PGA/Resdoc/

[by the way]

http://www.stat.tamu.edu/~jnewton/nrc_rankings/area39.html

I just believe that Chicago and Yale should not be in those positions...

[wannabee]

http://www.stat.tamu.edu/~jnewton/nrc_rankings/area39.html

I just believe that Chicago and Yale should not be in those positions...

I'm fairly sure that is the "older" NRC ranking...not the one that came out this past fall.

[hupr]

Here is the new set of NRC rankings:

http://chronicle.com/article/NRC-Rankings-Overview-/124714/

[by the way]

It's interesting that NRC and US News ranking are highly correlated (yet not identical, of course)

[Zahar Berkut]

Are U.S. News rankings on grad programs/subfields considered to be credible?

It's interesting that NRC and US News ranking are highly correlated (yet not identical, of course)

[Tufnel]

Are U.S. News rankings on grad programs/subfields considered to be credible?

The overall rankings are a decent benchmark. They are certainly not perfect but they are fairly accurate.

On the other hand, the subfield rankings are absolutely worthless. Some schools are ranked appropriately while others are 20 positions ahead/behind where they should be, which precludes one from gleaning any real utility from them.

Edited March 10, 2011 by Tufnel

[Zahar Berkut]

Thanks for the response.

In a similar vein, do any IR people look to the TRIPS survey from William and Mary for guidance on IR programs? At first I considered it a very strong indicator, until I realized a huge chunk of the respondants came from Harvard and Columbia. Maybe that won't skew things too much, but since these are "reputation" rankings...

The overall rankings are a decent benchmark. They are certainly not perfect but they are fairly accurate.

On the other hand, the subfield rankings are absolutely worthless. Some schools are ranked appropriately while others are 20 positions ahead/behind where they should be, which precludes one from gleaning any real utility from them.

[bees]

Thanks for the response.

In a similar vein, do any IR people look to the TRIPS survey from William and Mary for guidance on IR programs? At first I considered it a very strong indicator, until I realized a huge chunk of the respondants came from Harvard and Columbia. Maybe that won't skew things too much, but since these are "reputation" rankings...

TRIPS is decent too. To be honest, the main thing is 'do they place their students?' (bear in mind that starter jobs tend to be 20-40 places below your grad school on average) and who, and how closely, would you be working with? If you have a close working relationship with a faculty member who is pleasant, will write letters for you, and make 5 years of your life a non-miserable existence, then that's great.