U.S. News and World Report unveiled its 2006 graduate and professional school rankings last week, and the results showed little improvement for the University.
For the first time in more than a decade, only one of Duke’s trio of prestigious professional schools ranked in the top 10—the School of Medicine.
The Fuqua School of Business maintained its ranking of 11, tying with the University of California at Los Angeles. Duke’s School of Law also tied for 11th with Cornell University and the University of California at Berkeley after slipping one spot lower than last year’s ranking.
Provost Peter Lange expressed optimism despite the lack of improvement but also emphasized that rankings should be only one of the many factors taken into consideration by prospective graduate students.
“Once again, we are gratified that the quality of our programs is reflected in the latest U.S. News and World Report rankings,” Lange said in an April 1 statement. “We know that magazine ratings, particularly of graduate and professional programs, are limited by the methodology used, and students interested in pursuing graduate or professional education should consider a wide range of factors.”
The Pratt School of Engineering lost some ground, sinking two places to its current location of 32nd. Among its specialized programs, however, the school’s vaunted biomedical engineering program rose to fourth, from sixth last year, tying with the University of Washington.
U.S. News also reviewed doctoral programs in the social sciences and humanities, with Duke placing in the top 15 for more than half of the departments evaluated—12th in English, 15th in history, 8th in political science and 14th in sociology. Duke’s programs in economics and psychology were not far behind, placing 21st and 28th respectively. In all of the categories, Duke was tied with one or more schools.
U.S. News does not review every graduate and professional program each year.
The results for the School of Medicine were mixed. For the U.S. News rankings, medicine is broken into two categories: research and primary care. The school is also ranked in various specialties.
Like many other private medical schools, Duke is known for placing the most emphasis on its research program. Despite remaining in the top 10, the research ranking sunk to sixth, its lowest place since 2001.
The medical school’s primary care program, however, climbed the most of all Duke’s graduate and professional schools, rising to its highest ever—sixth—from last year’s ranking of 39th.
The School of Medicine also received its highest marks in the specialties of geriatrics and internal medicine, each ranking in the top five.
A fixture of the top 10 in the 1990s, last year Fuqua dropped to its lowest position in years—11th—and failed to regain its former status this year. Similar to last year, Fuqua’s Marketing and Executive MBA programs ranked among the top five in the country.
Despite the large emphasis often placed on a top 10 ranking, some Fuqua students expressed general disinterest with the results.
“Of course the higher ranking, the better,” said business student Bo Jiang. “But I think what you get from a school depends on yourself. All these top-tier schools have similar academic standards.”
Harvard University placed at the top overall for business, with Stanford University and the University of Pennsylvania tying for second.
The School of Law’s ranking has danced on the top-10 borderline for the last few years. Its drop to 11th, from 10th, is still higher than its 2004 ranking.
Several law students said as long as their school remained near the top, dropping a place or two had little bearing on their future career opportunities.
“I think the legal community has a pretty good idea about the quality of institution that Duke is,” said law student Meredith Schwartz. “That said, I would have liked to see us in the top 10.”
The ranking methodology in business, engineering, law and medicine uses two types of data: opinions from experts in the field and statistical information relevant to each program. The magazine also interviewed professional that hire new graduates and factored their opinions into the results.
For rankings in the social sciences and humanities, U.S. News based their findings exclusively on surveys from experts, including deans, program directors and senior faculty members.
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