Manipulação das cifras segundo os critérios:
"... The U.S. News and World Report “Best Colleges” rankings, which will be published next month, are viewed as a Baedeker and Bible by more than 5 million American parents considering colleges and universities for their high-school juniors and seniors.
We think that parents should use this guide with caution.
Our problem with the rankings begins with how they are produced. An unspecified number of academic leaders -- presidents, chancellors, provosts -- are sent questionnaires and asked to rate their peers. Though few of those surveyed have sat in on freshman lectures at Harvard or Yale (where students famously complain about the quality of undergraduate instruction), they invariably give the brand-name schools their highest endorsements.
Interestingly, when another college guide, the Princeton Review, surveyed students, half of the top 10 schools that U.S. News lauded for having “a strong commitment to undergraduate teaching” received a “C” grade or less.
More disturbing is that many of the measurements “Best Colleges” uses are subject to manipulation. As the survey has grown in importance, some school administrators have found ways to game the ratings race. One example: U.S. News ranks a school, in part, by the number of applications it receives compared with the number of students it accepts. Schools with higher rejection rates do better than those that admit a greater percentage of their applicants. We know of a young woman who was hired by the admissions office of a highly rated liberal-arts college to increase application numbers. The school wasn’t increasing its freshman slots, but was encouraging more teenagers to apply so that its rejection figures would be boosted..."
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