Forbes Magazine Ranks Claremont McKenna #40

August 14, 2008

Forbes Magazine has just released their very own "America's Best Colleges" list.  Claremont McKenna College is #40, Pomona is #20, and Harvey Mudd is #52.  Somehow Scripps and Pitzer didn't make it on the list (but check out what colleges did).  The methodology is listed along with the rankings:

1. Listing of Alumni in the 2008 Who's Who in America (25%)2. Student Evaluations of Professors from Ratemyprofessors.com (25%)3. Four- Year Graduation Rates (16 2/3%)4. Enrollment-adjusted numbers of students and faculty receiving nationally competitive awards (16 2/3%)5. Average four year accumulated student debt of those borrowing money (16 2/3%)(From Forbes.com)

I don't think this needs any commentary...

Check out the rankings website to see angry comments left by Ivy League students (Cornell: "wahh we never use ratemyprofessors.com because we have our own system... the methodology is flawed!") and Centre College alumni ("I'm tired of people bashing Centre College, the best school in Kentucky, just because we're #13 on the list and ranked better than 'elite' schools like Stanford and UChicago...").

Maybe Forbes is trying to make a point that college ranking systems are all fundamentally flawed; I could think of few better ways to make that point.  Making another "Best _______ in America" list will surely earn them lots of display advertising revenue. Visitors have to click through each school individually to see the whole list, which adds the potential for even more ads.  Maybe this will get some buzz, but it probably will not.  Maybe Forbes writers should stick to what they know and what we all know them for-- the "Forbes 400" rankings.