Only 150 schools of 3500 schools worth going to - #112 UConn | The Boneyard

Only 150 schools of 3500 schools worth going to - #112 UConn

Status
Not open for further replies.
Apparently the Colorado school of Mines is so good it is listed twice a t 14 and 18. Errors like that make the whole premise suspect as far as im concerned.
 
The schools are listed twice because they are public schools with two separate cost elements -- in-state and out-of-state. For example, Colorado School of Mines is listed in-state at 14 and out-of-state at 18.
 
.-.
Wait, somebody do the math - how many schools are worth going to and out of how many? Does URI get counted three times becuase they have in-state, regional, and out-of-region tuition. My head hurts.
 
I think someone should figure out how many FBS schools are mentioned in the top 150. Great selling point. UConn has moved up since 2010.

Yale fell from #8 to #32. :eek:
 
Here's a rough shot, I hope I didn't miss any (note: I didn't delete any of the second references to publics):

4 Stanford University PAC 12
8 Duke University ACC
10 University of Notre Dame IND
17 Georgia Institute of Technology ACC
21 University of California, Berkeley PAC 12
26 Georgia Institute of Technology ACC
35 University of California, Berkeley PAC 12
49 University of Virginia (UVA) ACC
50 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) B1G
52 Vanderbilt University SEC
54 Wake Forest University ACC
55 University of Southern California (USC) PAC 12
56 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) B1G
58 Texas A&M University SEC
60 Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) ACC
65 University of Virginia (UVA) ACC
67 University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) PAC 12
69 Texas A&M University SEC
70 University of Maryland (UMD) B1G
71 University of Michigan B1G
72 Rutgers University - New Brunswick B1G
75 Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) ACC
82 Rutgers University - New Brunswick B1G
86 University of Washington (UW) PAC 12
89 University of Maryland (UMD) B1G
90 University of Texas (UT) - Austin BIG 12
92 University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) PAC 12
93 Boston College ACC
101 University of Michigan B1G
103 Purdue University B1G
108 University of Washington (UW) PAC 12
109 Clemson University ACC
112 University of Connecticut (UConn) AAC
 
Here's a rough shot, I hope I didn't miss any (note: I didn't delete any of the second references to publics):

4 Stanford University PAC 12
8 Duke University ACC
10 University of Notre Dame IND
17 Georgia Institute of Technology ACC
21 University of California, Berkeley PAC 12
49 University of Virginia (UVA) ACC
50 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) B1G
52 Vanderbilt University SEC
54 Wake Forest University ACC
55 University of Southern California (USC) PAC 12
58 Texas A&M University SEC
60 Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) ACC
67 University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) PAC 12
70 University of Maryland (UMD) B1G
71 University of Michigan B1G
72 Rutgers University - New Brunswick B1G
86 University of Washington (UW) PAC 12
90 University of Texas (UT) - Austin BIG 12
93 Boston College ACC
103 Purdue University B1G
108 University of Washington (UW) PAC 12
109 Clemson University ACC
112 University of Connecticut (UConn) AAC
23 schools. We are the only one in an "odd" conference.
 
Two of the biggest things I don't like about this data

1) It's based on self reported salary data reported to PayScale only
2) The moment a student goes back to school for an advanced degree that person's salary is no longer counted.

The methodology is biased against bigger schools due to the higher variability in earning potential due to # of majors available - this is part of the reason why engineering and technical schools do so well here.
 
These articles are almost literally trash. It's stupid to post them since pretty much they would tell people to not invest in college - which makes the whole athletic piece of the equation disintegrate.

Shocking a website publishes articles that online classes may be a better value. Is there a link to the 'University of Phoenix' that says anything similar?

I can't wait for the first time I interview someone who holds an undergraduate 'degree' from on online school. It's a bit cruel but it will be entertaining.
 
.-.
The premise of ranking schools by ROI is idiotic anyway. It's not like an 18 year old can borrow a few hundred thousand at low interest rates to invest in something other than education.

Less costly public schools for the vast majority make more sense than private liberal arts schools? Ground breaking stuff there.
 
Two of the biggest things I don't like about this data

1) It's based on self reported salary data reported to PayScale only
2) The moment a student goes back to school for an advanced degree that person's salary is no longer counted.

The methodology is biased against bigger schools due to the higher variability in earning potential due to # of majors available - this is part of the reason why engineering and technical schools do so well here.

Engineering and technical schools do well because their grads get jobs in this economy, so that bias is a legitimate one. If you are spending big $ on a liberal arts degree, you are throwing money away. The world has changed.

My complaint about the salary data is that it is skewed agaisnt low cost locations. Look at the schools. Most are in the areas with the highest cost of living, and thus where higher salaries are paid. It is biased against schools that may send most of their kids to local jobs in low cost areas, like say U Arkansas. But you need less than half the money in Little Rock that you need in NYC.
 
Nice to see a former Secretary of Education completely misses the point of education...
 
Engineering and technical schools do well because their grads get jobs in this economy, so that bias is a legitimate one. If you are spending big $ on a liberal arts degree, you are throwing money away. The world has changed.

My complaint about the salary data is that it is skewed agaisnt low cost locations. Look at the schools. Most are in the areas with the highest cost of living, and thus where higher salaries are paid. It is biased against schools that may send most of their kids to local jobs in low cost areas, like say U Arkansas. But you need less than half the money in Little Rock that you need in NYC.

Yeah, but I see your "cost of living" raise you with "quality of life" which is also never factored in soI think it balances out. I wouldn't live in Little Rock for 1/5 the cost of NYC. Generally (and I personally exclude SoCal - I'm sure others will pick different places) cost of living is a good corollary for places you want to live. Places cost a lot because there are: 1) high paying jobs; 2) cultural attraction; 3) sporting attracting (sans college football); 4) interesting restaurants, bars, clubs; 5) diversity of people and opinion; etc etc etc.
 
Yeah, but I see your "cost of living" raise you with "quality of life" which is also never factored in soI think it balances out. I wouldn't live in Little Rock for 1/5 the cost of NYC. Generally (and I personally exclude SoCal - I'm sure others will pick different places) cost of living is a good corollary for places you want to live. Places cost a lot because there are: 1) high paying jobs; 2) cultural attraction; 3) sporting attracting (sans college football); 4) interesting restaurants, bars, clubs; 5) diversity of people and opinion; etc etc etc.

And I'd rather live in Little Rock than NYC at 1.5 times the price. There are more factors to cost of living, including zoning requirements, building codes, mandatory lot sizes, green spaces and other factors that drive up the cost of building. Houston, famous for its lack of any real zoning, has the highest ratio of salary to cost of living in the country.

The fact remains that for this to be a valuable list, salaries would need to be weighted by cost of living. A kid living in Iowa and liking Iowa is poorly served by this list. Educational value is highly localized. If you want to work in New Mexico, UNM is going to be much more cost effective than Michigan or Duke. A high level of local alumns will drive jobs to those grads. If you want a degree that carries weight nationally, and will allow you to seek a job in any market, then the list provides better information. Of course, once you've got 5-6 years experience, the degree won't matter much anymore.
 
.-.
Saw another article this morning (will post the link if I can find it) that referenced this study. The gist was - regardless of where you go, and what you study, there is NOTHING more devastating that going to college for a couple of years, racking up the debt, and not finishing.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/05/10/college_don_t_go_if_you_won_t_graduate.html

(found it)




Honestly, every person I know that did that never payed back on the debt anyway. I'm not saying its always the case, just my experience. Most of my friends that quit school were irresponsible well into adulthood and let school debt, credit card debt etc. go without a care in the world.
 
Honestly, every person I know that did that never payed back on the debt anyway. I'm not saying its always the case, just my experience. Most of my friends that quit school were irresponsible well into adulthood and let school debt, credit card debt etc. go without a care in the world.

You can't get rid of school loan debts in bankruptcy like you can the other debts. So eventually those friends will have to pay those loans back.
 
Engineering and technical schools do well because their grads get jobs in this economy, so that bias is a legitimate one. If you are spending big $ on a liberal arts degree, you are throwing money away. The world has changed.

My complaint about the salary data is that it is skewed agaisnt low cost locations. Look at the schools. Most are in the areas with the highest cost of living, and thus where higher salaries are paid. It is biased against schools that may send most of their kids to local jobs in low cost areas, like say U Arkansas. But you need less than half the money in Little Rock that you need in NYC.

I don't disagree, but the point that I was trying to make was that large universities may actually churn out the same number of engineers as those schools making the same amount of money but by definition they will have a lower overall ROI because there will be other students in less profitable majors.

That's the skewing that I was referring to - schools that offer a variety of career paths will generally do worse on these lists even if they have Top 10 programs in money making disciplines like Engineering and Business.
 
You can't get rid of school loan debts in bankruptcy like you can the other debts. So eventually those friends will have to pay those loans back.
Make payments with your credit cards or roll that debt into a Refinance and "wala", debt all gone.
 
How the hell did the Hokies get rated ahead of the Hoos?

How did the Maryland rate ahead of Michigan?
 
.-.
How the hell did the Hokies get rated ahead of the Hoos?

How did the Maryland rate ahead of Michigan?

Virginia Polytechnic Institute.
STEM degrees >>> Humanities degrees when it comes to educational ROI (fewer end up at Starbucks)

My alma mater is listed in the top 20 and I knew 2 business majors and 2 H&SS majors (both became Navy officers). Everyone else went into Science, Engineering and Technology.

Michigan must simply have more forestry majors and cost a few more bucks than Maryland.

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk 2
 
I don't disagree, but the point that I was trying to make was that large universities may actually churn out the same number of engineers as those schools making the same amount of money but by definition they will have a lower overall ROI because there will be other students in less profitable majors.

That's the skewing that I was referring to - schools that offer a variety of career paths will generally do worse on these lists even if they have Top 10 programs in money making disciplines like Engineering and Business.

Agreed. An engineering degree at U Iowa is probbaly just as valuable if not more so, than one from RPI or WPI. But the lack of weak majors skews the data.

What this shows most of all is that a science or technical major is the way to go.
 
What this shows most of all is that a science or technical major is the way to go.
I guess the best thing to take out of all this is that Herbst is pushing hard for innovative technological fields to be advanced at UConn.
 
If nothing else, that list is great PR for DeVry.

On the list with "the latest figures" looks like UConn is at 169. Still ahead of a few more prestigious institutions though (e.g. Penn State).
 
The only reason I got an accounting degree was the job market was crap in 1990 when it was time to pick a major and I didn't want to end up struggling. I know that kids often want to do what they want but they really need to understand that the investment needs to be useful.
 
.-.
Status
Not open for further replies.

Forum statistics

Threads
168,328
Messages
4,564,208
Members
10,464
Latest member
Rollskies27


Top Bottom