Five universities that really are
up-and-comers
By Daniel de Vise
Many in higher education love to
pick on the U.S. News rankings franchise— because it’s the dominant collegiate
ranking, and because ordinal rankings seem somewhat arbitrary and are difficult
to defend.
George Mason University has enjoyed a rapid ascent through the ranks of research universities. One reason: puppies. (Linda Davidson/The Washington Post - THE WASHINGTON POST))Yet, a U.S. News ranking provided part of the inspiration for a story in Wednesday’s Post about the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. For each of the last few years, U.S. News has listed the suburban campus among the nation’s top institutions for undergraduate teaching. The list is based on a survey of university presidents, provosts and admission deans, asking them to name schools they consider leaders in collegiate learning.
What struck me about the ranking
was the way UMBC stood out on the list. Here’s the rest of the top 10:
Dartmouth, Princeton, Yale, Brown, Stanford, Berkeley, Notre Dame, Miami
University and the College of William and Mary. All are actual Ivies, “Public Ivies”
or Ivy-caliber institutions.
UMBC is a decidedly different
sort of school.
For one thing, it’s
not the flagship. That distinction, in Maryland, goes to the University of
Maryland in College Park. It’s not hundreds of years old, either; UMBC opened
in 1966. For the first half of its young life, UMBC existed as a minimally
selective commuter school.
In a very brief span, the
university has ascended to the ranks of national universities, with serious
research ambitions and ranked doctoral programs.
UMBC is part of higher
education’s younger generation, so to speak, a cohort of universities that came
into their own in the second half of the 20th century and only recently joined
the ranks of “national” (as opposed to regional) universities.
Higher education is a relatively
static world: the vast majority of top-tier universities existed before the
20th century, built large endowments and, in the case of public institutions,
have long enjoyed a status as state flagships.
UMBC and its peers are a sort of
new breed: young, fast-growing schools that are swiftly ascending into the top
rank. Why have they prospered? Partly as a matter of simple growth: there are
far too many students in Maryland, California, Florida and most other states to
fit in the historic flagships. But it’s more than that. Faculty at these
schools say they’ve benefitted from a rare opportunity to build a university in
the modern era, with modern priorities and contemporary sensibilities.
(Although UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski notes the success of his school’s
classics department, hardly a cutting-edge pursuit.)
“What we’re working to do at UMBC
is to take the best of what we know about liberal arts colleges, and the best
of what we know about research universities, and put it together,” Hrabowski
said.
Here is a brief dossier on UMBC
and four other institutions with similar trajectories:
UMBC: Established in 1966 as part of the University
System of Maryland. Evolved from commuter school to residential research
university — a sort of second flagship behind U-Md. in College Park. SAT
averages rose 300 points in 25 years to 1206 (actually 400 points; I’m
subtracting 100 to compensate for recentering.) Joined the elite “Research I”
list in the past two decades; now listed as a “high research activity” school,
technically the second-highest Carnegie category. Annual research funding tops
$80 million. Ranked 157th among national universities by U.S. News.
Binghamton University :
Founded in 1946 as a two-year college. Evolved into one of four “university
centers” and an unofficial flagship of the flagship-less SUNY system. Ranked
90th among national universities by U.S. News. Joined the Research I camp over
the past 20 years, and now listed as a second-tier “high research” school.
Considered a “Public Ivy.” SATs average in the 1200s.
George Mason University: Founded as a freestanding institution in
1972, after serving as an anonymous branch campus of the University of
Virginia. Ranked 138th among national universities by U.S. News. Rated as a
“high research activity” university by Carnegie, with a $107 million research
budget and 33,000 students. Recognized, along with UMBC, as an up-and-comer by
U.S. News, and cited for strong minority completion rates. Moreover, the school
has enormous influence over development and culture in Northern Virginia.
University of California, Santa Cruz: Founded in 1965 as an outpost for the liberal
arts within the UC system — a sort of public Swarthmore. Evolved into a
Research I university over the past 20 years. Now categorized as a “very high
research activity” school. Ranked 72nd among national universities by U.S.
News, with elite admission stats. Beat out Berkeley and Stanford to house the Grateful Dead archives,
befitting its status as the unofficial torchbearer of the old Berkeley ethos.
What other campus could have spawned the band Camper Van Beethoven?
University of South Florida: Founded in 1956 as a modestly ambitious state
university. Evolved into sprawling Research I status over the past 20 years and
now considered one of 63 top-tier “very high research” institution, as well as
the eighth-largest U.S. university. Ranked 181st among national universities by
U.S. News. Like GMU, USF is known less for selectivity and more for the sheer,
impressive scale of its research and scholarship.
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Please also read my other well read articles
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