ParanoidAndroid Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 (edited) With the updated rankings slated to be published tomorrow, I thought this would be a good topic to discuss them. Here is the article regarding upcoming new rankings: EDIT: New rankings posted! http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-schools/statistics-rankings Here are the old rankings: 2010 Statistics rankings (Top 40): 1) Stanford 2) UC Berkeley 3) Harvard 4) Chicago 5) Washington 6) Carnegie Mellon 7) Duke 8) North Carolina State University 9) Texas A&M 10) Pennsylvania 11) Wisconsin-Madison 12) Michigan-Ann Arbor 13) Minnesota 14) Iowa State 15) Penn State 16) Coumbia 17) Cornell 18) Purdue 19) UNC-Chapel Hill 20) Ohio State 21) UCLA 22) Florida 23) UC-Davis 24) Illinois-Urbana Champaign 25) Iowa 26) Yale 27) Rutgers 28) Rice 29) Colorado State 30) Florida State 31) Connecticut 32) Michigan State 33) Boston U 34) Pittsburgh 35) George Washington 36) Northwestern 37) Georgia 38) Missouri-Columbia 39) Virginia Tech 40) Southern Methodist NOTE: I realized that some of these programs were equal in rating, so some of these schools are in fact tied. 2010 Biostatistics Rankings (Top 20) 1) Harvard 1) Washington 3) Johns Hopkins 4) UNC-Chapel Hill 5) Michigan-Ann Arbor 6) UC Berkeley 7) Minnesota 8) Wisconsin-Madison 9) UCLA 10) Columbia 11) Emory 12) Iowa 13) Boston U 13) Pittsburgh 15) U Texas Health Sciences Center 16) Medical College of Wisconsin 17) Medical U of South Carolina 18) Buffalo-SUNY 19) Virginia Commonwealth Edited March 11, 2014 by ParanoidAndroid wine in coffee cups, Stat Phd and ParanoidAndroid 3
ParanoidAndroid Posted March 11, 2014 Author Posted March 11, 2014 Let me know if I made a mistake there.
Stat Assistant Professor Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Looks like the updated rankings were just posted. http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-schools/statistics-rankings
ParanoidAndroid Posted March 11, 2014 Author Posted March 11, 2014 Looks like the updated rankings were just posted. http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-schools/statistics-rankings Wow, that must have been minutes after I posted this thread.
Stat Assistant Professor Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Heh. I am creating separate lists for statistics and biostatistics right now, will update this thread when I am done. Also, there are ties on the USNWR list so just because a school is listed below another does not mean that the one below it is ranked lower (U.S. News considers them equally ranked).
Nightgaunts Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Why are some schools listed twice? UW, Harvard, and University of Michigan-Ann Arbor all seem to be listed twice.
ParanoidAndroid Posted March 11, 2014 Author Posted March 11, 2014 Thanks Applied Math to Stat! Why are some schools listed twice? UW, Harvard, and University of Michigan-Ann Arbor all seem to be listed twice. They don't separate the biostats and stats rankings.
Stat Assistant Professor Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Biostats and stats are both ranked on this list. You have to click on the individual school to see stats vs. biostats. I am segregating the two right now, will post to thread when I'm finished
ParanoidAndroid Posted March 11, 2014 Author Posted March 11, 2014 Glancing at the new rankings, looks like the only new addition in the top 40 is NYU Sterns program (for statistics only).
faerare Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 (edited) Hm... are you sure the updated rankings have been posted already? On the main page (http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools), there are links to previews of the 2015 list. Edit: Clarified my question! Edited March 11, 2014 by faerare
ParanoidAndroid Posted March 11, 2014 Author Posted March 11, 2014 Hm... are you sure these are the updated rankings? On the main page (http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools), there are links to previews of the 2015 list. The rankings I listed in the OP are the 2010 rankings. Thought I would post them to compare. Seems like there isn't much of a difference in the Stats' programs. But there have been several new Biostat programs added in the 2014 edition.
Stat Assistant Professor Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 (edited) To separate statistics from biostatistics (these are the 2015 rankings): STATISTICS 1. Stanford 2. UC Berkeley 3. UChicago 4-5. Harvard, Washington (tied) 6. Carnegie Mellon 7. Duke 8. UPenn 9. Wisconsin 10-12. NCSU, Texas A&M, Michigan (tied) 13. Iowa State 14-17. Minnesota, Columbia, Penn State, UNC Chapel Hill (tied) 18-19. Cornell, Purdue (tied) 20-21. Ohio State, UC Davis (tied) 22-23. UCLA, Florida (tied) 24-26. UIUC, Yale, Iowa (tied) 27-29. Florida State, Rice, Rutgers (tied) 30-31. Colorado State, UConn (tied) 32. Michigan State 33-35. NYU, Northwestern, Pittsburgh (tied) 36-39. George Washington, Georgia, Missouri, Virginia Tech (tied) 40. SMU 41-45. UCSB, Arizona State, Oregon State, South Carolina, UVA (tied) 46-47. Temple, UC Riverside (tied) 48-49. Kansas State, Colorado-Denver (tied) 50-52. Baylor, Case Western, Kentucky (tied) BIOSTATISTICS 1-2. Harvard, Washington (tied) 3. Johns Hopkins 4-5. Michigan, UNC-Chapel Hill (tied) 6. UC Berkeley 7. Minnesota 8. UPenn 9-10. Columbia, UCLA (tied) 11. Yale 12. Emory 13. Brown 14-15. Iowa, Rochester (tied) 16. Pittsburgh 17. Boston University 18-20. Medical College of Wisconsin, UIllinois-Chicago, UTexas-Houston (tied) 21. Case Western 22. Medical College of South Carolina 23-25. SUNY Albany, Alabama, SUNY Buffalo (tied) 26. South Carolina, Virginia Commonwealth Edited March 11, 2014 by Applied Math to Stat ParanoidAndroid and wine in coffee cups 2
Stat Assistant Professor Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Michigan is tied with ncsu and Texas A&M thanks, I edited my post. I might have made some other errors in there but the general rankings are correct (I think...)
Stat Assistant Professor Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 i randomly checked the websites of some of the schools ranked from Colorado State & UConn and higher, and it seems as though job placement is pretty solid at all these schools... though of course, the faculty at the top tier schools nearly all have their PhDs from other top tier.
wine in coffee cups Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 According to the methodology, they have averaged survey results from fall 2009 and fall 2013 to compute these scores, so these don't completely reflect current perceptions vs. the 2010 version. Eyeballing the 2014 vs. 2010 reputation scores, it looks like most top programs remained the same or were nudged up one decimal place, with the biggest movement I see being Wharton bumped from 3.9 to 4.1. That reflects what I think a few people here have suggested, that Wharton has had some gains in reputation as of late and would be ranked even higher if just using the more recent data. Also: Response rates for the doctoral Ph.D. sciences were as follows: for biological sciences, 9 percent; chemistry, 18 percent; computer science, 35 percent; earth sciences, 17 percent; mathematics, 24 percent; physics, 29 percent; and statistics, 39 percent. statisticians
stats_applicant Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Stanford 4.9 4.9 Berkeley 4.7 4.7 Chicago 4.3 4.4 Harvard 4.3 4.3 Washington 4.3 4.3 CMU 4.1 4.2 Duke 4.0 4.1 Wharton 3.9 4.1 Wisconsin 3.9 4.0 NCSU 3.9 3.9 Texas A&M 3.9 3.9 Michigan 3.8 3.9 So assuming they did a 50-50 average of 2009 and 2013 (which admittedly is a wild assumption) the 2013 survey alone of the top few would look something like 1. Stanford 4.9 2. Berkeley 4.7 3. Chicago 4.5 4. Harvard 4.3 4. Washington 4.3 4. CMU 4.3 4. Wharton 4.3 8. Duke 4.2 9. Wisconsin 4.1 10. Michigan 4.0 11. NCSU 3.9 11. Texas A&M 3.9 putting Wharton in the top five.
literaryreference Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Also no mention of BU's stat program, only biostat. Is this meant to be comprehensive in any way? Does a school need to actively court USNWR to attain a ranking? If this is the best they can do, I'm going to substantially deemphasize these rankings in my decision, I don't think these accurately reflect the consensus opinions of the academic community outside of the very top tier. Any chance Cyberwulf, or any other academics could weigh in on this? gradschoolroulette 1
wine in coffee cups Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Many of the schools I applied to are not mentioned anywhere on this list including George Mason, University of Arizona (which has to be better than Arizona State), U Maryland College Park (which has a very good reputation), U Maryland Baltimore County, U Mass, SUNY Stonybrook (very good school), and a few others. My impression is that this list is a regurgitation of the obvious top 10, and blows at discriminating outside of that range. Also no mention of BU's stat program, only biostat. Is this meant to be comprehensive in any way? Does a school need to actively court USNWR to attain a ranking? If this is the best they can do, I'm going to substantially deemphasize these rankings in my decision, I don't think these accurately reflect the consensus opinions of the academic community outside of the very top tier. Any chance Cyberwulf, or any other academics could weigh in on this? All of the programs you named (besides George Mason) are not standalone statistics programs, but rather concentrations in statistics housed inside math, applied math, or "mathematics and statistics" departments and thus ranked under math.
CauchyProcess Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 All of the programs you named (besides George Mason) are not standalone statistics programs, but rather concentrations in statistics housed inside math, applied math, or "mathematics and statistics" departments and thus ranked under math. In this case, how do we determine what the ranking applies to? How to distinguish whether a department of this type has a strong reputation in stuff like geometry/topology vs statistics/probability?
stats_applicant Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 In this case, how do we determine what the ranking applies to? How to distinguish whether a department of this type has a strong reputation in stuff like geometry/topology vs statistics/probability? The US News rankings do include some subfields: http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-science-schools/mathematics-rankings Unfortunately, it doesn't include probability/statistics.
wine in coffee cups Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 In this case, how do we determine what the ranking applies to? How to distinguish whether a department of this type has a strong reputation in stuff like geometry/topology vs statistics/probability? If you're trying to assess reputation, you look at the main signalers that the faculty US News surveyed would have likely had in mind. I think things like: how many people in the department are well-known figures in the statistics community (highly cited publications, awards, frequently invited to give lectures at conferences or other departments)? Are faculty generally publishing in reputable statistics journals and the big machine learning conferences (as opposed to unknown journals or almost entirely niche venues for their area of application)? Do a fair number of PhD graduates place into nice-sounding academic positions?
ParanoidAndroid Posted March 11, 2014 Author Posted March 11, 2014 Also no mention of BU's stat program, only biostat. Is this meant to be comprehensive in any way? It's strange considering BU Stats was a top 25 program in the previous rankings.
cyberwulf Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Also no mention of BU's stat program, only biostat. Is this meant to be comprehensive in any way? Does a school need to actively court USNWR to attain a ranking? If this is the best they can do, I'm going to substantially deemphasize these rankings in my decision, I don't think these accurately reflect the consensus opinions of the academic community outside of the very top tier. Any chance Cyberwulf, or any other academics could weigh in on this? Honestly, the rankings look fairly reasonable to me, though you could make the case for some programs to move up/down by a couple of ranks. Most of what these rankings measure is reputation, and since perceptions are slow to change they tend not to pick up on "recent" developments (i.e., things that have happened in the past 10-20 years). For example, I think that Iowa State might be a tad over-ranked relative to their current strength, likely because they were a legitimately elite program 25+ years ago.
clurp Posted March 11, 2014 Posted March 11, 2014 Stanford 4.9 4.9 Berkeley 4.7 4.7 Chicago 4.3 4.4 Harvard 4.3 4.3 Washington 4.3 4.3 CMU 4.1 4.2 Duke 4.0 4.1 Wharton 3.9 4.1 Wisconsin 3.9 4.0 NCSU 3.9 3.9 Texas A&M 3.9 3.9 Michigan 3.8 3.9 So assuming they did a 50-50 average of 2009 and 2013 (which admittedly is a wild assumption) the 2013 survey alone of the top few would look something like 1. Stanford 4.9 2. Berkeley 4.7 3. Chicago 4.5 4. Harvard 4.3 4. Washington 4.3 4. CMU 4.3 4. Wharton 4.3 8. Duke 4.2 9. Wisconsin 4.1 10. Michigan 4.0 11. NCSU 3.9 11. Texas A&M 3.9 putting Wharton in the top five. You've got an unconventional approach to taking averages, for sure. Wharton's average ends up being higher than the scores it received in either year. Same for some of the other schools ... Igotnothin 1
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