Unranked and Embarrassed: GW Administrators Look to Move Forward

By Chris Evans 

Nearly a week after US News and World Report's unranking of  George Washington University (GW) from their annual college rankings, President Steven Knapp and his administration sat down to answer the school's questions. 

Monday night's event, hosted by the Student Association (SA), marks the first time administrators publicly addressed students since it was announced that GW admissions had been inaccurately calculating and reporting admission statistics to US News and World. 

US News and World Report Leaves GW Unranked 

Since responding to the inaccurate ranking reports by stripping GW of its' ranking, US News and World has stated it will keep GW unmarked for the year and reassess the university's ranking for the next publication of their report on colleges and universities--often used by parents and students when considering prospective colleges. 

President Steven Knapp was joined on the panel by Provost Steven Lerman, Dean of Students Peter Konwerski, VP of External Relations Lorraine Voles, and Senior Associate Provost for Academic Affairs and Planning, Forest Maltzman. 

Introduced by SA President Ashwin Narla and Vice President Abby Bergren, President Knapp made it clear that, "We're embarrassed by this mistake." Knapp explained that the university alerted US News and World immediately upon finding the discrepancy and that even though the University is now unranked by the report, "We remain the same institution as we were a week ago." 

Maltzman Breaks Down What Happened

Maltzman divulged the timeline of what occurred.  He explained that over the summer when the Provost's office was reorganized, the admissions policy was reviewed. "One variable did not pass the sniff test," said Maltzman. While SAT scores from the incoming class stayed relatively flat compared to past years, class rank statistics went noticeably up. Upon review it was determined the procedure for estimating class rank was inaccurate. 

Determining students' class ranks is not as easy as viewing their SAT scores.  According to Maltzman, "High schools report class rank in different ways, some don't report." 

The admissions office would simply estimate where a student might be in their class rank by looking at their SAT/ACT score, GPA, and course load.   The estimation procedure that has been used for around twenty years was off and as Maltzman put it, "We were all sort of surprised."

Provost Lerman Explains How University Plans to Move Forward

Lerman explained the university's action plan to move forward telling students and community members at the town hall meeting that, "We report what happened and we make sure it does not happen again." 

Lerman said, "those responsible are no longer responsible for the data." 

He went onto explain that the statistics found and reported will also now be audited by an outside auditor to ensure only numbers available are used in the report--no more of the estimating that Knapp stated, "should never have been done."

 Lerman's second part of the plan indicated the University's calculation of statistics will no longer be done by admission workers but rather separate and independent people. 

Finally, the Administration made it clear they agreed with GW students' call for change. Lerman said, "we are recruiting a new manger of enrollment to look over data and admissions reporting who will act solely as a point person." 

Vice President for External Relations Lorraine Voles reached out to students.   

She said, "We'll answer every question we can." 

Voles, who is in charge of GW's new image and outreach for prospective students, told those in attendance that the University is charging forward in clarifying that being stripped of the ranking is not a reflection of the education and opportunities available to GW students and those looking at possibly making GW their home. 

Provost Lerman agreed, telling town hall participants that, "this University is not defined by its' rankings." 

Potential Effects of US News and World Ranking 

Students and community members voiced concern about GW's integrity in the eyes of prospective students as well as prospective employers. The administrative panel eased student's concerns reiterating that the US News and World Report is only one set of numbers and that GW will be ranked once again next year--likely very near its former position of 51. 

Knapp commented, "these rankings are problematic for an institution of our nature." 

While trying to make a neutral way to rank universities, the report does not take into consideration unique opportunities offered by individual universities. In fact, Knapp took students by surprise when he told them, "GW looses credit in the ranking system for having part time faculty teach [such as Supreme Court Justices teaching law classes, government officials lecturing a course, or other Washington residents that offer time teaching a class or two at GW]."

Other than causing the University to revisit it's strategy for calculating and reporting statistics of incoming students and putting more pressure on the administration, there is no defined effect of GW being unranked.  

While embarrassed and surprised by being stripped of its ranking, the GW administrators are moving forward, following Provost Lerman's call to, "decide our own destiny."

U.S. News and World Report "Unranks" University

By Evan Ritscher

U.S. News and World Report has changed the George Washington University’s national ranking in light of erroneous data the school provided to the news organization over the course of the past decade.

Earlier, U.S. News ranked the school as the nation’s 51^st-best university. However, in a statement released Wednesday, the news organization announced they will remove GW from that list and will classify the university as an “unranked" school.  U.S. News will not re-examine the university until next fall for the 2014 rankings, if the school can prove the accuracy of its new data submission.

The move comes as GW announced on November 8^th that for close to 10 years, it had been incorrectly calculating important information about students who decided to attend the university. As a result, the university had been giving flawed data on its admissions process and students to organizations like U.S. News and similar institutions that use the data in their ranking of colleges and universities.

Among the most important data GW incorrectly reported to the ranking organization was statistics on the portion of students who ranked in the top 10 percent of their class. In some cases the actual data was 20 percent lower than what the school reported.

For example, for the class of 2015, the university claimed 78 percent of students were in ranked in the top 10 percent of their high schools. In actuality, the number was 58 percent. Such flawed data, which U.S. News and World Report claims makes up 6 percent of its methodology in determining school rankings, lead to the organization’s decision to “unrank” the university.  

U.S. News classifies schools as "unranked" if they fall into the second tier of national universities, if they are liberal arts colleges, regional colleges, or regional universities, or if they fail to pass U.S. News’ own cutoff level. However, it is unclear what specific criteria U.S. News used in its decision to remove GW from its rankings.

President Steven Knapp released a statement Wednesday, saying the university was surprised and disappointed by U.S. News' decision to remove GW's ranking rather than adjust it.  Knapp also stated the university plans to improve safeguards meant to prevent these errors from occurring again.

Other schools had similar issues with misreporting data recently. Both Emory University in Georgia and Claremont McKenna University in California disclosed that they reported incorrect data earlier this year. But U.S. News did not remove either of those schools from its rankings.