As UConn plays rating game research investment lags

At every opportunity, the University of Connecticut proclaims its lofty position in the U.S. News college rankings. The university claims that it is among the best public universities in the nation, and is the number one public university in New England. However, neither of these claims is true, except to a very limited degree.

The U.S. News rankings are very popular, but many of its criteria are subjective and easily manipulated, as noted by Forbes (Sept. 27, 2017). To illustrate: the major component of the ranking’s Faculty Resource Index is the number of undergraduate classes enrolling fewer than 20 students. The underlying rationale is that it would be desirable, especially for advanced undergraduates, to have contact with professors in classes of 10, or 15, or so.

UConn’s response over the years has been to put a 19-student cap on required writing courses, which are in high demand. This assures that all 19 spaces will be filled in these courses which may, or may not, be in the students’ majors. Some might view this practice of generating many classes with exactly 19 students as “gaming the system,” but it does increase one’s ranking.

Apart from its deficiencies in assessing teaching, U.S. News ranking system barely addresses the second hallmark of a major university: Research. Many contend that it is research that separates these universities from liberal arts colleges. Although they are less well-known to the public, there are several published rankings that focus upon universities’ research standing. They examine how much faculty publish, how much these publications are cited by other researchers, the grants awarded to faculty and the induction of faculty into prestigious national academies.

These research rankings sometimes include subjective measures, such as the perceived reputation of universities. When they do, they involve judgments by academic experts — and not the opinions of high school guidance counselors, which is the U.S. News approach.

Two of the most recent rankings come from The Center for Measuring University Performance (2016) and the Shanghai Rankings of World Universities (2017). The latter, according to Forbes, “has a take no prisoners approach to measuring the quality of universities that makes U.S. News’ look silly and anemic.”

UConn scores very poorly on both of these rankings across the Arts & Humanities; Physical, Biological and Social Sciences; Engineering and Technology. In none of these broad subject fields does UConn ever rank among the top 300 universities in the world.

By comparison, UMass-Amherst consistently ranks among the top 200. As for induction into the prestigious National Academies of Science or Engineering, only one faculty member on the Storrs campus is currently included. There are seven on the Amherst campus. So, what is the best public university in New England?

Supporting academic research is expensive. It requires laboratories, equipment, reduced teaching loads, support for post-docs, etc. Over the past 25 years UConn directed funds that could have supported research to adding layers and layers of administration until studies showed that UConn led the nation in administrative bloat (reported in Connecticut Mirror, Jan. 10, 2013.)

This administrative proliferation has particularly involved highly paid vice provosts. To illustrate: on the Storrs campus (which excludes the Health Center and the regional campuses), there is a: provost, the chief academic officer, with an executive assistant; a vice provost for Academic Operations, also with an executive assistant; and a vice provost for Academic Affairs, also with an executive assistant. In Admissions, there is a vice provost for Enrollment and an assistant vice provost for Enrollment and a large number of directors of admission.

The list goes on, but the picture is clear. UConn paid its money and made its choice: administration over research.

Mark Abrahamson is a retired University of Connecticut professor and vice provost, and former program director at the National Science Foundation.