Student here for one 6-week semester to fill some courses. SMC is so much more beautiful than my original CCC (De Anza). It is arguably more beautiful than like most of UCs😭 I am jealous to you guys! (btw writing course that I took here was also top-notch)
First of all, the ranking is not stats-based. A large portion (45%) of the ranking is based purely on surveys they email to “employers and institutions.” These surveys allow the respondents to choose the 10 best domestic universities for employment and 30 universities abroad. The United States has an immense number of excellent universities. The widely recognized Top 30 (T30) U.S. universities are all among the best in terms of research, student outcomes, and brand recognition, both domestically and internationally. These universities have immense revenues and R&D expenditures that almost no other universities can even imagine. So, what makes up the Top 10 in the U.S.? We all know them from U.S. News & World Report. All the other excellent universities in the United States are disadvantaged compared to those in other countries, which might have a maximum of only 5 to 10 decent universities nationwide that get selected in these surveys every time simply because their universities and employers have no other choices.
Furthermore, asking respondents to name 30 universities abroad is a joke - nobody really knows 30 universities outside of their respective countries well. Because of this, these surveys, which weigh 30% of the ranking as “academic reputation,” transform into an echo chamber where respondents simply look at international rankings and select the T30 abroad. Ultimately, this 45% survey weighting largely benefits countries lacking an abundance of decent universities and harms objectivity by relying on the global awareness of faculty members.
Second, it is a big myth that this ranking is research-based. Only 20% of the ranking goes to “Citations per faculty,” which is the only metric where objective citations actually play a role. Moreover, the quality of their data for this metric is likely poorly obtained. If you compare it to genuine research rankings, such as ARWU, Nature, and Leiden, you will see a lot of flaws and ridiculous inconsistencies.
Third, another 15% of the ranking goes to “Global Engagement,” using metrics such as “International Faculty Ratio,” “International Research Network,” and “International Student Ratio.” One has to wonder how this can be considered even slightly important for evaluating a university's quality, even if the ranking pretends to be “global.”
The faculty-to-student ratio and employment outcomes can be somewhat justified, but again, the sources for this data are highly unreliable. They use “their own database of impactful alumni” and a third-party survey with at least a 20% response rate. By the way, these two metrics have only a 15% impact on the overall ranking.
At the end of the day, if you want to choose a university based on its ranking, I suggest using national rankings such as U.S. News & World Report Undergrad, Forbes, WSJ, LinkedIn, Times, or general layman prestige. These metrics are more diverse and relevant to your specific region. If you do not care about employment outcomes and want a purely research-focused metric, use ARWU, Nature, and Leiden, which are much better for grad school than for undergrad. If you want to gauge the general perception in other countries, more stats-based rankings like THE or CWUR, and even specific government policies like the High Potential Individual visa in the UK, can give you a much better understanding. You can even try using Google Trends to measure the national and international awareness of specific universities.
QS tries to do everything but fails to do anything.
First of all, the ranking is not stats-based. A large portion (45%) of the ranking is based purely on surveys they email to “employers and institutions.” These surveys allow the respondents to choose the 10 best domestic universities for employment and 30 universities abroad. The United States has an immense number of excellent universities. The widely recognized Top 30 (T30) U.S. universities are all among the best in terms of research, student outcomes, and brand recognition, both domestically and internationally. These universities have immense revenues and R&D expenditures that almost no other universities can even imagine. So, what makes up the Top 10 in the U.S.? We all know them from U.S. News & World Report. All the other excellent universities in the United States are disadvantaged compared to those in other countries, which might have a maximum of only 5 to 10 decent universities nationwide that get selected in these surveys every time simply because their universities and employers have no other choices.
Furthermore, asking respondents to name 30 universities abroad is a joke - nobody really knows 30 universities outside of their respective countries well. Because of this, these surveys, which weigh 30% of the ranking as “academic reputation,” transform into an echo chamber where respondents simply look at international rankings and select the T30 abroad. Ultimately, this 45% survey weighting largely benefits countries lacking an abundance of decent universities and harms objectivity by relying on the global awareness of faculty members.
Second, it is a big myth that this ranking is research-based. Only 20% of the ranking goes to “Citations per faculty,” which is the only metric where objective citations actually play a role. Moreover, the quality of their data for this metric is likely poorly obtained. If you compare it to genuine research rankings, such as ARWU, Nature, and Leiden, you will see a lot of flaws and ridiculous inconsistencies.
Third, another 15% of the ranking goes to “Global Engagement,” using metrics such as “International Faculty Ratio,” “International Research Network,” and “International Student Ratio.” One has to wonder how this can be considered even slightly important for evaluating a university's quality, even if the ranking pretends to be “global.”
The faculty-to-student ratio and employment outcomes can be somewhat justified, but again, the sources for this data are highly unreliable. They use “their own database of impactful alumni” and a third-party survey with at least a 20% response rate. By the way, these two metrics have only a 15% impact on the overall ranking.
At the end of the day, if you want to choose a university based on its ranking, I suggest using national rankings such as U.S. News & World Report Undergrad, Forbes, WSJ, LinkedIn, Times, or general layman prestige. These metrics are more diverse and relevant to your specific region. If you do not care about employment outcomes and want a purely research-focused metric, use ARWU, Nature, and Leiden, which are much better for grad school than for undergrad. If you want to gauge the general perception in other countries, more stats-based rankings like THE or CWUR, and even specific government policies like the High Potential Individual visa in the UK, can give you a much better understanding. You can even try using Google Trends to measure the national and international awareness of specific universities.
QS tries to do everything but fails to do anything.
First of all, the ranking is not stats-based. A large portion (45%) of the ranking is based purely on surveys they email to “employers and institutions.” These surveys allow the respondents to choose the 10 best domestic universities for employment and 30 universities abroad. The United States has an immense number of excellent universities. The widely recognized Top 30 (T30) U.S. universities are all among the best in terms of research, student outcomes, and brand recognition, both domestically and internationally. These universities have immense revenues and R&D expenditures that almost no other universities can even imagine. So, what makes up the Top 10 in the U.S.? We all know them from U.S. News & World Report. All the other excellent universities in the United States are disadvantaged compared to those in other countries, which might have a maximum of only 5 to 10 decent universities nationwide that get selected in these surveys every time simply because their universities and employers have no other choices.
Furthermore, asking respondents to name 30 universities abroad is a joke - nobody really knows 30 universities outside of their respective countries well. Because of this, these surveys, which weigh 30% of the ranking as “academic reputation,” transform into an echo chamber where respondents simply look at international rankings and select the T30 abroad. Ultimately, this 45% survey weighting largely benefits countries lacking an abundance of decent universities and harms objectivity by relying on the global awareness of faculty members.
Second, it is a big myth that this ranking is research-based. Only 20% of the ranking goes to “Citations per faculty,” which is the only metric where objective citations actually play a role. Moreover, the quality of their data for this metric is likely poorly obtained. If you compare it to genuine research rankings, such as ARWU, Nature, and Leiden, you will see a lot of flaws and ridiculous inconsistencies.
Third, another 15% of the ranking goes to “Global Engagement,” using metrics such as “International Faculty Ratio,” “International Research Network,” and “International Student Ratio.” One has to wonder how this can be considered even slightly important for evaluating a university's quality, even if the ranking pretends to be “global.”
The faculty-to-student ratio and employment outcomes can be somewhat justified, but again, the sources for this data are highly unreliable. They use “their own database of impactful alumni” and a third-party survey with at least a 20% response rate. By the way, these two metrics have only a 15% impact on the overall ranking.
At the end of the day, if you want to choose a university based on its ranking, I suggest using national rankings such as U.S. News & World Report Undergrad, Forbes, WSJ, LinkedIn, Times, or general layman prestige. These metrics are more diverse and relevant to your specific region. If you do not care about employment outcomes and want a purely research-focused metric, use ARWU, Nature, and Leiden, which are much better for grad school than for undergrad. If you want to gauge the general perception in other countries, more stats-based rankings like THE or CWUR, and even specific government policies like the High Potential Individual visa in the UK, can give you a much better understanding. You can even try using Google Trends to measure the national and international awareness of specific universities.
QS tries to do everything but fails to do anything.
There is a myth that international students who study at Ivy League in the U.S. are the best from their respective countries.
Well, it is usually a complete false for relatively unknown countries (fewer applicants than SE/S Asia, etc.).
Some people I know that got into UPenn this and previous (and even on full-ride lol) cycles from my country have bs Olympiads as the main spikes that are not even respected within my country (do not give any benefits even for local 2nd tier universities), let alone internationally. These are made-up non-prestigious Olympiads in subjects nobody actually participates in (like languages with small number of speakers, rural and uncompetitive regions of participants etc). They are also vastly over exaggerating their preparation to these kind of Olympiads. On the contrary, I know numerous examples of people with real ISOs (IMO, IPhO, IEO, IJSO, etc.) who cannot get into any U.S. universities. I know that the lack awareness of regional AOs can lead to these consequences - although, there’re actually some colleges that can filter this bs (MIT is probably the best example). It is not even honest to domestic applicants, as these “top international” kids are usually less impressive than domestics (should be vice versa). At top colleges it just looks like a lottery, where your chances slightly depend on how much you lie/over exaggerate in your application - unfortunately, handful of universities actually check internationals at all. Something should be changed…