Prestige Among Graduate and Professional Schools: Comparing the U.S. News’ Graduate School Reputation Ratings Between Disciplines

Abstract

Using a conceptual model, this study examines the variables associated with the U.S. News and World Report peer assessment ratings of graduate and professional schools in business, education, engineering, law, and medicine. What are the correlates of prestige among the nation's leading graduate and professional schools, and are they consistent with prior studies of prestige? Not since the studies of the 1995 National Research Council (NRC) data have scholars examined the correlates of prestige for individual graduate programs, and no study has ever extensively examined the U.S. News graduate ratings. Using available data from U.S. News, as well as institutional websites and ISI Web of Science information, this analysis finds robust relationships between the U.S. News graduate school reputation ratings and the model-relevant indicators, especially enrollment size, admissions test scores, and faculty publications per capita.

Ranking International Business Institutions and Faculty Members Using Research Publication as the Measure

“…such studies, among others, include the ranking of (a) authors and universities publishing iB articles (Morrison and inkpen 1991;trevino et al 2010); (b) authors, institutions and discipline content of published articles in the Journal of International Business Studies (JiBs) between 1970(inkpen and Beamish 1994; (c) authors and disciplines of articles published in JIBS between 1984and 1993(chandy and Williams 1994; (d) international business schools based on the measure of faculty publication (Kumar and Kundu 2004); and (e) schools based on publication data between 1995 and 2004 for four leading international business journals (chan et al 2006). the role and importance of ranking studies is well documented in literature spanning a variety of disciplinary areas, from sociology (espeland and sauder 2007; Sauder and espeland 2009), logistics (carter et al 2009), Strategy (Baden-Fuller et al 2000), Finance (Zivney and Bertin 1992), economics (Grove and Wu 2007), Management (Devinney et al 2008;Pisani 2009;Wedlin 2007;Werner 2002), Marketing (caruana et al 2009;Linton 2004;Mitra and Golder 2008), information systems (Willcocks et al 2008), Education (Sweitzer and Volkwein 2009), Research Methods (Mills et al 2006), to International Business (Macharzina et al 2004;Macharzina et al 1993). in addition to their broad disciplinary appeal, ranking studies have consistently appeared in prestigious journals for a long period of time.…”

How Variances in Business School Rankings Affect Enrollment Trends and Practices

“…Nevertheless, different studies also showed the chance that the reputation of a parent school is often caused, in part, by the professional schools (business, law, and medical) that they have (Devinney, Dowling, Perm-Ajchariyawong, & Dowling, 2006). Sweitzer and Volkwein (2009) have argued that, at the undergraduate and graduate levels, size and admissions statistics (selectivity) are the main drivers of institutional reputation.…”

“…However, at the business school level size, student quality, and rankings have become the main keys behind institutional reputation (Rindova et al, 2005;Safon, 2007Safon, , 2009Sweitzer & Volkwein, 2009). Rindova et al (2005) put forth a model for organizational reputation that they applied to business schools in the United States.…”

“…Business school rankings are used by many people as a source by many to determine which business school to attend, work at, or even to send their children. Thus, rankings are seen as a measure of prestige Freid, 2005;Sweitzer & Volkwein, 2009). The main goal of this study was to allow administrators to determine the impact that rankings have on their enrollment trends and practices and to assist them in effectively assessing how to best determine strategies to deal with the impact of the rankings of their institution.…”

In Pursuit of Prestige: the Folly of the US News and World Report Survey

“…In fact, they seemed to confirm that reputational surveys, such as the one generated by USNWR, are highly variable because of the vague manner in which standards of quality are measured and the erratic methodologies used. [2][3][4] Discouraged, I considered other options (albeit, facetiously): bribe my colleagues (unethical); curry favor with every other college of pharmacy administrator I meet (difficult to do and inconsistent with my brusque personality); or populate every college administrative structure with our alumni (impossible in such a short time frame).…”