Resistance to those school rankings grows
I'm lurking on the National Assn. for College Admission Counseling listserve, watching college advisors from some swank schools vow to boycott the U.S. News & World Report college rankings. U.S. News surveys high school college advisors for their opinions as part of the process.
On top of the group letter from high school superintendents to Newsweek announcing refusal to participate in its high school rankings process, this is really heartening.
Here are two ways the U.S. News rankings directly harm college applicants:
-- As a poster noted in a comment the other day, colleges' "yield" is factored into those rankings — the number of students the college accepts who then decide to enroll. So a college may not accept a highly qualified applicant it thinks is perhaps TOO highly qualified and will choose a more-prestigious school. If you're that applicant and you wanted that college, you lose.
-- U.S. News judges colleges favorably if they get lots of applicants so they can reject a lot. That influences colleges to market themselves heavily to draw more applicants. Aside from issues like the cost and environmental impact of the marketing (and often the annoyance to the recipient) — and resources going into marketing instead of education — much of the marketing makes it sound to the recipient like a sure thing. Obviously that sets applicants up for disappointment, and can lead them to aim at perhaps not the best targets for them.
As for ranking high schools, the superintendents who signed that protest letter pointed out that the rankings reward schools that teach children of privilege, and penalize schools that deal with challenges through no fault of their own.
On top of the group letter from high school superintendents to Newsweek announcing refusal to participate in its high school rankings process, this is really heartening.
Here are two ways the U.S. News rankings directly harm college applicants:
-- As a poster noted in a comment the other day, colleges' "yield" is factored into those rankings — the number of students the college accepts who then decide to enroll. So a college may not accept a highly qualified applicant it thinks is perhaps TOO highly qualified and will choose a more-prestigious school. If you're that applicant and you wanted that college, you lose.
-- U.S. News judges colleges favorably if they get lots of applicants so they can reject a lot. That influences colleges to market themselves heavily to draw more applicants. Aside from issues like the cost and environmental impact of the marketing (and often the annoyance to the recipient) — and resources going into marketing instead of education — much of the marketing makes it sound to the recipient like a sure thing. Obviously that sets applicants up for disappointment, and can lead them to aim at perhaps not the best targets for them.
As for ranking high schools, the superintendents who signed that protest letter pointed out that the rankings reward schools that teach children of privilege, and penalize schools that deal with challenges through no fault of their own.
posted by caroline at
4:20 PM
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