we went over this in another thread. the shanghai list is a joke because it is completely skewed towards big universities that fund a lot of research that has absolutely no impact on what goes on at the undergrad level.
we went over this in another thread. the shanghai list is a joke because it is completely skewed towards big universities that fund a lot of research that has absolutely no impact on what goes on at the undergrad level.
You left off the University of Oregon which admits 100% of it's applicants ;-)
Shanghai is the most accurate survey there is for universities.
These debates are always entertaining. People get more worked up about scholastic rankings than they do about religion, politics, and who has the cutest baby.
I'm always interested to see how many times the crazy California guy will post. I think he's at 3 right now.
Fear The Turtle, beeeeyatch! But in all seriousness, these rankings are so arbitrary as to be meaningless.
Quick Read wrote:
Also, the University of Maryland being ahead of UNC, USC, Vanderbilt, Carnegie Mellon and Brown is ridiculous.
What gets your university on the Shanghai list are things such as: Publish Original Research, win Nobel Prizes, snag Stealth Drones out of thin air, park a satellite on an asteroid and then blast off for earth, invent the Internet, discover the God Particle, prove Global Warming, unlock the Human Genome, etc. If your school hasn't done things like that it won't be on the Shanghai List.
Back to the Lab wrote:
What gets your university on the Shanghai list are things such as: Publish Original Research, win Nobel Prizes, snag Stealth Drones out of thin air, park a satellite on an asteroid and then blast off for earth, invent the Internet, discover the God Particle, prove Global Warming, unlock the Human Genome, etc. If your school hasn't done things like that it won't be on the Shanghai List.
80% of the score is based on the accomplishments and productivity of the faculty - apart from teaching. But that does not make the ranking arbitrary or meaningless.
It is almost impossible to measure the quality of teaching independently of other factors.
It's a personal value judgement. Those who believe that the Shanghai criteria are important probably lean towards cutting edge research. Other schools may specialize in a liberal arts approach or vocational/practical overview of the material. Whatever floats your boat.
Azaleas wrote:
I'm always interested to see how many times the crazy California guy will post. I think he's at 3 right now.
Nah, he's at 5 already. This is clearly his new thing.
Purple Cow wrote:
Williams...not even on the list. Man we suck!
The list only included universities. Williams (College) wasn't considered. Bigger 'oversight' was Dartmouth College, which is a de facto university possessing multiple PhD programs, a business school, medical school, and engineering school. Would probably have been ranked around 13-15 if included.
these things are interesting but at the end of the day not that important. I went to a large state school (top 40) which has a phenomenal science department, namely physics and molecular biology. I'd rather learn about physics from a nobel laureate there than at a better ranked university without one. But even this is still not super important.
Ultimately, uni is what you make of it. We all use the same text books and the teaching is more or less limited by this and a managable curriculum which doesn't fail a huge proportion of the class. Back in med school I was more prepared than kids from harvard, stanford, etc and knew WAY more than most of them despite haven taken the same classes. Im sure they had great teachers too, but didn't take as much advantage. Ive also met ppl from places like vassar and other smaller liberal arts schools who knew more than me because of the small class sizes and one on one with decent profs who know their stuff.
I attended both #2 and #4 on the list.
Because I am awesome.
University of Phoenix FTW!
Uhh, University of Texas isn't that good.
009 University of Chicago
I'm a post-doc here.
MA Cantab, MSc London, DPhil Oxon.
Great to see the USA domninating a China-based survey. It takes superb faculty to teach graduate students and undergraduates who a part of the process producing earth shattering research and scientific breakthroughs for mankind.
That list is kind of a joke! Who in their right mind would rate University of California, San Diego as the 15th best university in the world, higher than Northwestern, Washington University, and Duke, each of which is far more prestigious and much more difficult into which to be accepted???
Universities of Illinois, Minnesota, and Colorado are also ranked higher than Duke!
Also, Brown University is only ranked #65?
UCLA at #12 ? way too high
University od Washington at #16? Way too high
If you add colleges in, these schools drop out of top 30 easily