Various Parameters Evaluated While Preparing Engineering Universities Ranking

There exist a number of engineering schools across the United States. Not everyone can get admitted into MIT, Stanford, UCB or Georgia Tech, so it is important to understand which other universities or colleges are well-reputed and can offer you quality education. Whatever system you choose to assess your college’s ranking; it is important to know what aspects you should focus on.

1. Graduation and Retention Rates

Graduation and Retention Rates refer to the proportion of first-year students who continue their engineering program in the sophomore year and then eventually graduate. So, the higher the proportion, the better a university is apt to offer classes, labs or services that students require to succeed. This measure is inclusive of two categories, six-year graduation rate (80%) and first-year retention rate (20%). The former indicates the mean proportion of a graduating class that earns a degree, while the latter indicates the mean proportion of first-year students that entered the school in a particular year and returned the following year.

1. Undergraduate Academic Reputation 

The U.S. ranking method also considers the opinions of those in a position to assess a school’s undergraduate level of academic excellence. For this, Academic Peer Assessment Surveys are conducted that includes the take of university’s student body presidents, deans of admissions and provosts among many others.

1. Research

Perhaps the most important factor while assessing engineering universities’ ranking is the research work that is carried out by its students and faculty members. A university that is academically impeccable, with a strong world-reputation and groundbreaking work will generally have a higher rating in this particular aspect. The sub-categories assessed in this dominion include citations per paper, academic peer endorsements, frequency of its research being internationally awarded and the number of research papers per faculty.

1. Faculty resources

If the students are well-connected with their professors and are satisfied with their teaching methodology, then the chances of learning increase significantly. For this reason, various teaching resources such as class size, faculty salary, student-faculty ratio, proportion of full-time faculty and proportion of professors with expert degrees in their field, are considered. Each of these factors is attributed a certain percentage depending on which the ranking is carried out.

1. Innovation

Research in engineering universities involves subjects that go beyond the realm of academic programs. Non-academic research has played a crucial role in driving development in the industry of science and technology. While ranking engineering universities, three factors related to innovation are rated that contribute to the overall ranking. These are the number of credible patents, spin-off companies launched from the university and particular industry-oriented research. The greater the level of innovation and knowledge transfer, the higher is the ranking of an engineering school.

1. Employability

The graduate employability ratio is measured to assess the university’s reputation in the work environment. This rating helps to understand what the probability of the institution to provide job opportunity to all its students is. Factors monitored closely include recruiter’s review, on-campus employer presence, graduates’ employability and career support services provided.

1. Financial Resources

The financial resources used by an engineering university to foster student research and innovation, instruction, campus construction, student services and other relevant educational expenditure is assessed to understand the school’s ability to spend for better education. It is important to note that spending on sports, dorms or hospital facilities are not included while measuring the financial resources.

1. Specialist Criteria

Engineering universities ranking is also based on the types of programs offered, the field they are offered in and whether certain unique specializations are provided or not. This category primarily judges the accreditations and discipline rankings.

A careful perusal of the above mentioned factors can easily help you sort out good universities to pursue your engineering degree. There are numerous universities for engineering across the States, so make sure you enroll in one that suits your needs and one that holds a fine reputation as well!