People who know me personally know I can be a bit… loud. Not just in volume, but in curiosity. I question everything. Even if it’s just in my head, I need to understand where things come from, what drives them, and most importantly, who benefits.
With that quick insight into how my mind works, here’s a question I think more families should be asking, because it opens the door to a much-needed conversation:
Why are you letting a magazine tell you where your kid should go to college?
Seriously. Would you pick your doctor because a panel of other doctors ranked them in a popularity survey?
Would you buy a house based on how much the neighbors donated to their HOA?
Because that’s basically how most college rankings work. Yet every year, families cling to those lists like they’re gospel. They build their entire strategy around U.S. News. As if being number 38 versus number 102 is going to make or break their kid’s future.
This is our daily routine. Smart families. Talented kids. All chasing a number on a list built on the wrong metrics, with the wrong goals, for the wrong reasons.
The message is always some version of:
“We’re looking at top 50 schools only.”
“My daughter’s aiming for a top 25 business program.”
“We’re not interested in anything outside the U.S. News top 100.”
I get it. You want the best for your kid. But here’s the uncomfortable truth.
College rankings are not about students. They’re about marketing.
If you’re using them as your north star, you’re probably walking away from better options without even realizing it.
Let’s break down how these rankings are actually built.
Take U.S. News & World Report, the most known of them all. The doom for many. For years, they ranked colleges using a formula that included reputation scores from other college presidents, alumni donation rates, faculty salaries, and spending per student.
What do those things have to do with your child’s education? Their job after graduation? Whether they’ll be happy, supported, and successful?
Not much.
Here’s something most families don’t know. In 2022, Columbia University dropped from number 2 to number 18 after one of their own professors exposed the school had submitted inaccurate data. Let that sink in. There was no change about the student experience. Nothing changed about the type of graduates or the quality of education. They just got caught playing the rankings game, and down the list they went. This makes you question how reliable the list was to begin with.
The University of Chicago once had an acceptance rate around 40 percent. It was still a top-tier academic institution. Infamous for its rigorous curriculum, but not considered ultra-elite by the rankings system, mainly because of that higher acceptance rate. That changed when UChicago hired a marketing firm. Yes, a…marketing firm. The kind that, if they had their way today, would probably pitch a UChicago TikTok dance collab with an influencer in a lab coat. That kind. They went all in. Rebranded the brochures. Refined the messaging. Flooded mailboxes across the country with glossy packets, many sent to students who had zero shot at getting in. But that was the point. The more unqualified applications they received, the lower their acceptance rate would go.
Guess what, it worked. Over the years, UChicago’s acceptance rate dropped from 40 percent to around 5 percent and subsequently now UChicago tops most rankings or is fighting for a top spot. The reality is that the academics didn’t change. The experience didn’t change. The same type of student was gaining admission and the same type of student was graduating. The perception did. A shift built not on substance, but strategy.
While UChicago played the system to climb the rankings, Babson went the other way. They opted out. In 2021, Babson College, one of the top business-focused schools in the country, decided to stop submitting data to the U.S. News for its undergraduate rankings.
Babson felt the system didn’t align with what actually mattered to students and families. Their exact words were that the methodology didn’t accurately reflect return on investment or real-world outcomes. They weren’t wrong.
Babson consistently ranks near the top of PayScale’s ROI lists and is known for producing highly employable graduates in entrepreneurship and business. U.S. News didn’t showcase that, because their formula favors peer assessments and how much schools spend per student.
This goes on point with a conversation more families need to have. Are we valuing what actually matters, or just what looks good on a list?
A lot of parents see rankings and immediately think ROI. They assume a top-ranked school means better outcomes but that’s not always true.
According to PayScale’s College ROI Report, the schools with the highest returns, meaning the best salaries versus what you paid in, are often schools most families overlook.
- Harvey Mudd College regularly tops ROI lists, beating several Ivy League schools in real earning potential.
- Babson, Santa Clara, and WPI are consistently near the top.
Meanwhile, some well-known schools with huge price tags have some of the lowest ROI numbers out there. If you’re paying over $70,000 a year just to say “My kid goes to a top 25 school,” the real question should be: is it worth it?
We work with families who go down both roads. Some chase prestige. Others chase fit. The outcomes speak for themselves. We’ve seen kids accept huge scholarships at schools they’d never heard of before working with us. They thrive. They get mentorship. They land internships and job offers. They walk out with a degree, at a lower cost and real clarity.
We’ve also seen the other side.
Families that go all in on the brand-name school, pay triple the cost just because it’s top 50, and a year later, they’re calling back. Their kid is overwhelmed, not playing, and thinking about transferring. The family is now $45,000 in the hole. And nobody posts that story on Instagram.
Instead of asking “Where does it rank?” here’s what we focus on:
A number on a list means nothing if your kid is miserable or invisible.
Sometimes, the obsession with rankings isn’t even about the student. It’s about the parents. You’ve worked hard. You want to say “My daughter’s going to [insert name here].” You want to feel like all the effort paid off with something impressive.
You have to remember that the goal isn’t to impress people who don’t matter. It’s to help your kid build a life that does.
No one’s going to care what number was next to your child’s college when they applied. What will matter is how prepared they are when they leave.
Stop chasing someone else’s definition of top. Build a strategy around your child’s real goals, strengths, and future.
The real flex isn’t a ranking. It’s a student who walks onto campus knowing they chose this for the right reasons, and is proud to be there.
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