U of C ranks #8 in 2009 national listing

U.S. News and World Report published their much anticipated 2009 college and university rankings today. This year, the University of Chicago landed a ranking of eighth best university for undergraduate study--tied with Columbia and Duke. Harvard, Princeton, and Yale once again garnered the list's top three spots.

Both the Report's 2007 and 2008 rankings listed the U of C as #9. The University jumped six spots from #15 in 2006 to #9 in the 2007, after the University began evaluating the Report's ranking methodologies and tracking the way the Report interpreted information about the University.

After the University dropped several ranks over the past several years, University administrators chose to take an increasingly active role in reporting admissions statistics, spending on its undergraduate programs, selectivity, and retention rate.

As part of the University's decision to revamp its reporting procedures, Michael Behnke, vice president for University relations and dean of College enrollment, and several other University administrators visited the magazine's headquarters in Washington, D.C. two years ago.

"In discussing their methodology and some of the ways we were answering the questions, the magazine thought we were misinterpreting some things," Behnke told the MAROON in October 2006.

While many students, parents, and alumni laud the University for its recent efforts to bolster the College's image and raise publicity, the University has come under scrutiny from those wary of current college admissions procedures.

Some have characterized the University's switch to the Common Application as a means of bolstering national rankings by broadening applicant pools and increasing selectivity. Since Zimmer announced the application overhaul, the Facebook groups such as "Save the Uncommon Application" and "The Uncommon Application Appreciation Society" have cropped up on the University of Chicago network in protest of the switch.

In May 2007, the Education Conservancy, a non-profit organization that works to combat what it calls the "commercialization" of the college admissions process, circulated a letter among college and university presidents asking them to refuse to fill out the reputation portion of the U.S. News and World Report questionnaire.

“We believe these rankings are misleading and do not serve well the interests of prospective students in finding a college or university that is well suited to their education beyond high school,” the presidents said in the letter. Among other reasons, they argue that the rankings “encourage wasteful spending and gamesmanship in institutions’ pursuing improved rankings…and overweight the importance of a university’s prestige.”

Although upwards of 60 schools signed onto the letter, University of Chicago President Robert Zimmer refrained from signing.

Nevertheless the University says that the rankings remain a force to be reckoned with for the foreseeable future.

“The rankings are not going to go away, so we’d prefer for them to have accurate information than to go fishing around websites” for data, Behnke said, in a September 2007 MAROON article. “There are some colleges that don’t participate but that are still ranked.”