In the future she would like the NRC survey to include agriculture and nutritional science programs and address student outcomes, reputation of PhD programs outside the U.S., interdisciplinary and emerging fields, information technology, the environment for doctoral education and the differing missions of PhD programs. Amy Graham, director of data research at U.S. News and World Report, said that universities are wasting money on consultants who advise on how to improve rankings. Instead, she recommended that universities call her office directly or check the U.S. News web site, where underlying data for U.S. News rankings are published. A PhD in economics from the University of Virginia, Graham is responsible for data collection and analysis for America's Best Colleges and America's Best Graduate Schools, published annually by U.S. News. She noted that U.S. News gets very little criticism from students who use its surveys, and that there is little evidence of colleges and universities not telling the truth.
Rankings are relative.
Our goal should be improving education, not improving rankings. She said U.S. News will continue to improve its data collection methods, re-examine its selection of measures and weights, and add interactive features to its web site. Kuh said that the NRC has difficulty finding objective measures for ranking PhD programs in the arts and humanities, and that the number of library books has become less important. The forum was presented by the Center for Studies in Higher Education and moderated by its interim director, Professor Arnold Leiman. The Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research helped fund the event, which was followed by a meeting with Charlotte Kuh and Jim Voytuk of the NRC to discuss possible changes in methodology for the next NRC study.