WSJ: Pitt is Best in Northeast, Among Best in World
PITTSBURGH—The University of Pittsburgh is among the top universities in the world and is the best public university in the Northeast according to the Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education College Rankings.
Pitt’s campus in Pittsburgh has the highest scores in three of the four categories that the overall rankings are based on: student outcomes, academic resources, and student engagement.
Much of the data used to create the rankings came from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, known as IPEDS. Schools are required by the U.S. Department of Education to report key statistics to IPEDS, making it a comprehensive source for education data.
The rankings examined an institution’s resources, a category that includes the amount of money each institution spends on teaching per student, the ratio of students to faculty members, and the number of published scholarly research papers per faculty member. This category accounted for 30 percent of the overall view.
Engagement accounted for 20 percent. Times Higher Education captured student engagement across the United States through its US Student Survey. For 2015-16 THE gathered the views of more than 100,000 current college and university students on a range of issues relating directly to their experience at college. These issues are engagement with learning, a student’s opportunity to interact with others, a student’s likelihood to recommend a school to friends or family, and the number of different subjects taught.
Outcomes were weighed at 40 percent. The category was broken into these elements: graduation rates, potential post-graduation salary, a student’s ability to repay loans, and a school’s academic reputation.
The remaining 10 percent measured environment, which examined the make-up of the student body at each campus, helping students understand whether they will find themselves in a diverse, supportive, and inclusive environment while they are at college. The proportion of international students and student diversity—both racial and ethnic diversity as well as economic diversity—were also measured.
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10/27/16/klf/jm
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