The single greatest part of U.S. News & World Reportâ??s formula for ranking undergraduate colleges is also the most controversial: the “peer rankings” in which college presidents rank all similar institutions.
Criticism of the system as unfair has grown, leading many liberal arts college presidents to boycott this part of the system. The rankings system was also the subject of much ribbing when Clemson University released records showing that its president ranked his university about every other one in the country.
Rankings will be much in the news in the weeks ahead, with the latest from U.S. News due out this week and the doctoral program rankings of the National Research Council, using a new methodology, due out some time soon.