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Most Bothersome Wake Forest Development in the last 12 months? Pit/Tunnels Adjace

awakegirl said:
One more thing. I agree if you live in NC and get into Chapel Hill, it’s nearly impossible to argue value, but most states don’t have a top ranked public university that is affordable.
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which is more important to be highly ranked or to have an extensive and active alumni network?
I think the entire "top college" is a scam. It may help with getting into a graduate school and possibly the first job. After that...it's all who you know and how you've performed in job 1
 
donaldross said:
To you that's the case, I get that. You know Wake Forest. However, 1000s of the best 13-17 year olds will now never get to know Wake Forest. Will some venture down the last into the 40s? Sure, of course, they will know someone who knew someone. However, thousands and thousands of the best of the best will now not even have us on their list. I am not saying they will reject us--they just will not even look at us. It doesn't matter what spin we put on this, those that matter will not ever hear the spin since we are now not even on their college list.
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I agree with this.

No matter how we feel about the rankings and the criteria they use (agree or disagree), it does bump us down the list.

I guess the question is how many people actually use the USNWR to seek out schools they want to attend? I don't want to downplay it, but I am guessing it's fewer than we think given the sheer amount of information that is available out there now instead of just one magazine publishing the end all be all rankings every year.
 
WindyCityDeac said:
which is more important to be highly ranked or to have an extensive and active alumni network?
I think the entire "top college" is a scam. It may help with getting into a graduate school and possibly the first job. After that...it's all who you know and how you've performed in job 1
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I don’t disagree that performance matters after college, but I do think Wake and UNC have opened a few doors for me resume wise, getting clients, etc. I also live in a small state with very few good public options, like a decent chunk of NE/NY and realize I’m probably on the hook for private college.
 
WindyCityDeac said:
which is more important to be highly ranked or to have an extensive and active alumni network?
I think the entire "top college" is a scam. It may help with getting into a graduate school and possibly the first job. After that...it's all who you know and how you've performed in job 1
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Yeah, that’s a pretty important prerequisite to the next sentence.

Wake dropping off the first page of the rankings is not going to help when you have grad school admissions or HR goons scanning resumes and seeing how you eked out a 3.4 at a tier 2 school when this other guy got a 3.9 at chapel hill.
 
06deacon said:
Yeah, that’s a pretty important prerequisite to the next sentence.

Wake dropping off the first page of the rankings is not going to help when you have grad school admissions or HR goons scanning resumes and seeing how you eked out a 3.4 at a tier 2 school when this other guy got a 3.9 at chapel hill.
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Reality is HR goons don't do the resume scanning. Algorithm's do, and I don't believe they have USNWR rankings as part of the Algo.

ETA: No offense to the wonderful HR Goons on these here boards
 
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Are graduate schools or HR folks really going to all of a sudden be like "well Wake is actually barely top 50 instead of top 30 in USNWR, so I'm not as impressed!"?

I think the Wake name speaks for itself a good bit, especially in the south. I won't pretend to know the weight it holds outside of down here.
 
dartsndeacs said:
Are we still #1 in hottest guys ? Or did we stop having to send in our pictures with our applications in some woke blind agenda ?
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For anyone new here, please let me warn you against requesting pictures from palma
 
Deacsfan27 said:
Are graduate schools or HR folks really going to all of a sudden be like "well Wake is actually barely top 50 instead of top 30 in USNWR, so I'm not as impressed!"?

I think the Wake name speaks for itself a good bit, especially in the south. I won't pretend to know the weight it holds outside of down here.
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It has a great name amongst the rich people sending their kids there.
 
scooter84 said:
You missed his point - he was saying that he hopes we don't abandon the small class sizes, etc. in favor of chasing the criteria that the formula now favors - and I agree.
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I didn’t miss his point. I explained that abandoning small class sizes etc would not help chase the criteria because they are 0% of the formula.

Your fear is unjustified.
 
PhDeac said:
I didn’t miss his point. I explained that abandoning small class sizes etc would not help chase the criteria because they are 0% of the formula.

Your fear is unjustified.
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Even if it’s 0% of the formula, the danger is we go away from small class sizes to free up/emphasize professor time on research.
 
PhDeac said:
I didn’t miss his point. I explained that abandoning small class sizes etc would not help chase the criteria because they are 0% of the formula.

Your fear is unjustified.
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Yes, I understand that but you definitely missed the point. Abandoning small class sizes, etc. could definitely help our ranking if we do so to focus on criteria that the formula values.
 
LilburnDeac said:
I think this hits on the key issue- what is the purpose of a college education? Is it to prepare students to succeed in the job market? Or is it to provide a place for students to grow and develop intellectually?
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I’ll add to this. Is a college education a glide path for wealthy children to become wealthy adults? Is it a transformative experience that can uplift an entire family (whether they’re elite athletes or not?)

Wake has gone too far with the former and perhaps this shock to the system will encourage them to shift to the latter.
 
scooter84 said:
Yes, I understand that but you definitely missed the point. Abandoning small class sizes, etc. could definitely help our ranking if we do so to focus on criteria that the formula values.
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No I understood that point. But I was giving you the benefit of the doubt. I really hoped you were saying don’t add first generation students and using “class sizes” as cover. But I guess I should assume the worst.
 
Haros said:
Even if it’s 0% of the formula, the danger is we go away from small class sizes to free up/emphasize professor time on research.
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And to lower costs or free up some $ for need-based support.
 
lol what ph? I think you really are assuming the worst.

Call it “small class sizes” or call it “having a teaching professor in a small class” rather than a TA teaching the class while the professors focus primarily on research. Because the latter seems like it’d boost the ranking even though its the anti-Wake approach.
 
What CMU does to game the metrics while not conforming to the spirit of the "first generation" ambition is to open the doors to wealthy, cash paying, "first generation" foreign students. All of the metrics can be manipulated if leaderships goal is to boost the rankings. Of course focusing on that goal, diverts attention from other topics that they should maybe consider.

I'd rather see Wake maintain fidelity to their historical philosophy. Keep small class sizes that are taught mostly by Ph.D. who focus on teaching. Leadership should focus more on marking that a Wake education is a much closer approximation to a Princeton education that the vast majority of other schools. That obviously comes at a financial cost and we do not have the endowment to go hog wild. It is unfortunate that US News is abonding the % of alum giving metric; I fear that may lead to a decrease in needed fund raising. I don't have the data, but I suspect a fair number of alums, particularly younger alums, may have contributed $100/year to the general fund knowing it helped the rankings. Those small contributions help too and a larger endowment is important to being able to maintain the class size/teaching priorities while also address some of Ph.'s goals of admitting (and enrolling--don't forget enrolling) lower income/first-gen students.
 
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