College Presidents Revolt Against Rankings

College Presidents Plan U.S. News Rankings Boycott

Everyone who has attended college knows of the U.S. News & World Report rankings. The annual list of the best colleges and universities has grown in importance over the years and has come to the leading authority on how "good" a school is.

This over-dependence on one set of rankings, and a disagreement over how their scores are compiled, has lead a group of college presidents to sign a letter urging others to boycott the ranking system.

The debate is centered around a reputational survey that accounts for a hefty twenty-five percent of a schools final score. A school's reputation score is assessed by administering a survey to college presidents. The survey, which is a list of hundreds of schools, asks the presidents to rank each institution on a scale from 1 to 5.

Critics charge that this is a inaccurate way to measure a schools quality, and its twenty-five percent weighting distorts the rankings.

The rankings system also unfairly penalizes schools who use unorthodox criteria for admissions. Sarah Lawrence College of Bronxville, N.Y stopped using SAT scores in their admissions process. U.S. News & World Report then threatened to create a false number to use in their formula. A U.S. News spokesman calls it a "miscommunication".

The boycott encourages school presidents not return the survey, or use the rankings on promotional material. Last year 70% of them were returned.

Lloyd Thacker, lead author of the circulating boycott letter and head of The Education Conservancy, said "I'm hopeful that whatever comes out of this [boycott] sends different kinds of signals and messages to students, so they realize that when they are in high school, they can follow their curiosity."