Med school decries low ranking as unfare

By Lee Nagao

For many years, the publication of the U.S. News and World Report ranking of the nation's best graduate and professional schools confirmed the Yale School of Medicine's reputation as a world leader with a ranking in the top five--until now. In the new 1997 ratings, which hit newstands on Mon., Mar. 3, the med school dropped to number six.

Based on qualitative assessments ranging from student selectivity to National Institutes of Health funding to student-faculty ratio, Yale fell from third to sixth with a 94.4 rating. Yale rated significantly lower than the top two med schools: Harvard scored a perfect 100.0 rating, while Johns Hopkins was second with a 99.7 rating.

"The U. S. News and World Report survey is a very artificial matrix," Lawrence S. Cohen, special advisor to the medical school dean, said. "[For instance], a weighting of 30 percent was given to the category of NIH funding. This is a very arbitrary judgement." He also added that "if you look at the overall difference between the third through the sixth ranked schools the difference is only about 0.6 points--a trivial statistical anomaly."

According to Robert Morse, director of research for the ranking program at U.S. News, the drop in ranking is primarily dueto a 25 percent reduction in Yale's research funding received from the NIH.

Cohen believes that a more accurate ranking would consider the percentage of NIH applications funded rather than total dollar amount of NIH funding, which is the current method. According to Cohen, by using a percentage analysis rather than a total funding measurement, larger schools, which could submit more applications and thus receive more funding, would have less inherent advantage over smaller schools.

"Say for the sake of argument that a very large school like Harvard submits 1000 applications for funding and 200 get accepted. This would correspond to a 20 percent acceptance rate, while let's say Yale submits 100 and 40 get accepted, giving 40 percent acceptance," thus discriminating quality from quantity, according to Cohen.

Thomas Lentz, professor of cell biology, concurred. Although he believes that "prospective students do look at [the rankings] closely," he also said that "they are making a mistake" in doing so. "The rankings should be used as a guide, but ultimately the student should pick a school with the type of program that is right for them. That best school may not even be in the top 25," Lentz said.

Cohen further criticized the rankings for not taking factors such as student activities into account. "Most important, though, is that what doesn't go into the rankings is a qualitative assessment of the students. Over 60 percent of our students are involved in community service activities and this is not considered...there are certain difficult things to measure which never make it into the survey."

The extent to which the rankings reflect the relative quality of the school and how much they affect the decisions of prospective students remains unclear. Students are more directly affected by program structure and academic atmosphere than by the benefits of research dollars. "The students here are disappointed [in the lower rating] because there is a lot of school spirit--they are proud of being here," Alicia Arbaje, MED '99, president of the medical student council, said. "But people realize that these rankings fluctuate every year. As a current student, I wouldn't take the rankings seriously," she said.

She added, however, that as a prospective med student she would consider them. "If you are accepted by the top schools in the country, then the choice often comes down to the little things." Nevertheless, students like Arbaje said they were attracted to Yale primarily because of it's curriculum. "Grades aren't emphasized and the students are treated as colleagues [by the professors and doctors]...it creates a supportive environment, and the program is flexible, so I can do community service or extra-curricular activities on the side," Arbaje said.

Abhijit Patel, MED '02, a MD-PhD student, is more concerned with fluctuations in research funding. "I remember actually looking at that NIH funding column. If you are a graduate student or an MD-PhD student then it matters," he said. "But for the average med student, funding is probably the least important category," he added.

Echoing Cohen's concerns, Patel added that student satisfaction is most definitely a vital ranking criterion. "They don't consider student well-being, which I think should be more important than NIH funding," he said.

Judy Lin, who is applying to medical schools, admitted that the rankings have influenced her somewhat, but she added that "in general, I don't put all my faith into these polls, because I'm sure that there are probably politics involved in determining where every school stands." Back to News...