The Academic Registries of World Universities just published their list of the best colleges in the world for 2009. While America dominated with 17 out of the top 20, I was a little taken back by some of the choices.
I'll admit that this is my first year taking a look at the list, but the following choices left me guessing when they outranked other Ivy League schools like Brown:
14. UC San Diego
16. University of Washington
17. University of Wisconsin-Madison
Check out the entire list of the best colleges in the world at http://www.arwu.org/ARWU2009.jsp.
UC San Diego is not even 50 years old, but it is consistently ranked among top US universities. Roger Revelle who was the director of Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the time was the visionary who created UC San Diego by recruiting the very best scientists available. He was able to attract those who didn’t necessarily fit into the traditional university structure and were willing to try a new more interdisciplinary approach to higher education. Now, UC San Diego is not only a science. engineering and medicine powerhouse, it has some of the best programs in the country in economics, theater. and international development.
Thanks for the response Lawrence. I lived in California for a long time and UCSD definitely had a reputation as a major party school. It’s good to see that it has transcended this image in the eyes of many!
UCSD is not San Diego State University (SDSU)….It is the University of California San Diego. Apparently “Collegesavings” has no idea what he/she is talking about. UCSD is one of the best public universities in the world. Their professors are constantly winning Nobel prizes as leading researchers. This University located in La Jolla, California, simply dominates in all majors.
I’d definitely argue that UCSD has a local reputation as a party school. As someone who grew up in southern California, we use to head down to UCSD (not SDSU) to party it up. It’s no Chico, but it definitely was a blast.
Hi William-
I’d be interested to know your opinion of the drug and alcohol related statistics reported for UCSD (not SDSU).
According to the government’s Office of Post Secondary Education, for 2007 (2008 is still being compiled) the ON-CAMPUS disciplinary actions at UCSD (in La Jolla) were as follows:
-1,587 liquor law violations
-144 drug law violations
That’s a total of 1,731 on-campus violations for a campus that the OPE reports as having 27,520 students.
That is one alcohol or drug violation at UCSD for every 15.89 students. It is argued that the real rate is even higher, since students often party in Mexico and incidents related to those excursions often go unreported.
By comparison, UC Santa Barbara (UCSB) is often voted one of the top party schools in America by Playboy magazine and others, has a on-campus incidence rate that is actually lower (1 incident per 16.17 students).
UCLA, which can definitely get wild from time to time (I spent enough time there to know), has an incident rate half of UCSD (UCLA is approximately 1 incident for every 30 students).
While I have a ton of respect for UCSD’s programs (though I don’t think they should have ranked as high as they do), to think that there isn’t some decent partying going on at UCSD seems a little naive.
FYI, Wisconsin has been ranked in the top 10 by every major college ranking since 1925 (I can send you a copy of these) and UCLA , UCSD have been ranked in top 20 for the past 30 years….you have been taking the US News report seriously.
Also, the average ranking for US Universities from 1925-1995 is:
1)Berkeley
Princeton
2) Harvard
3) Chicago
4) Wisconsin
5) Michigan
6) Yale
7) Columbia
9) MIT
10)Cornell
The problem with the US News report is that the academic reputation is flawed in its methodology. It can be easily proven statistically that 84% of public schools are underrated and 58% of private schools are overrated. Even its own Graduate ratings are uncorrelated with the same reputational scores from the undergraduate ratings with a correlation score of 51% (r=0.51)
you guys are nuts. UCSD is the farthest thing from a party school (surprisingly, since it is on the beach)… I don’t know when you people partied here, but it must’ve been a LONG time ago (or really lame parties).
oh and one more thing. maybe you should take a statistics class at ucsd because you’d learn that your statistic of:
1,731 on-campus violations for a campus that the OPE reports as having 27,520 students = one alcohol or drug violation at UCSD for every 15.89 students.
Is actually VERY flawed.