Penn adjusts to life among the top 10

Everyone wants to be the best. And five years ago, Penn set out to become the best -- or at least one of the top 10. As the first major goal of the Agenda for Excellence, officials strived to make Penn one of the top 10 schools in undergraduate and graduate education. Although this sounds like a straightforward goal, quantifying which universities make the "top 10" is a subjective task that has left many in disagreement. Everyone's heard of lists that attempt to rank academic institutions -- The Princeton Review are U.S. News and World Report are among the most recognized. And while these lists, which try to measure academic experiences, have become extremely popular, they lack cohesion. Some say Penn's reputation is great, others still say it has a ways to go. According to U.S. News Editor Stephen Smith, Penn's academic reputation has skyrocketed in recent years. "Our reporters... all say that it's a really hot school right now," said Smith, a 1971 Penn graduate. And other lists have echoed those sentiments. In July 2000, the University of Florida published a paper called "The Top American Research Universities," which ranked schools based on their performance in areas such as total research expenditures, endowment, faculty awards, doctoral degrees and freshman SAT scores. Of the ranked private universities, only 10 were ranked in the top 25 in all categories. Penn was one of them. University President Judith Rodin says that Penn is among the prestigious top 10. "Absolutely," she said. "And with pride." Smith noted that Penn's current status -- number six on his magazine's list -- is the result of a domino effect. More applications lead to higher quality applications which lead to a lower acceptance rate and a higher yield. "Pretty soon you've got a school that's hot as hell," Smith explained. "And that's what you've got right now." And Penn's jump to number six is a significant one. When the magazine began its rating system in 1984, Penn was not even among the top 20. In addition to the U.S. News rankings, which are based on several statistic measurements, The Princeton Review annually publishes an book entitled The Best 331 Colleges, a compilation of 62 "top 20" lists generated by student survey responses. This year, Penn's name appeared on two lists. Five years ago, it only appeared on one. And while being considered in the top 20 in only two areas may at first seem disappointing, the book's publicist, Jeanne Krier, said this should not be the case. "It takes a lot for a school to even be on these lists," she said. Robert Franek, the book's author, said that determining whether a school is "one of the premier research and teaching universities in the nation and in the world" -- the wording used in the Agenda -- is vague. "It's a loaded word," he said. "It means different things for different people." But according to Provost Robert Barchi, that is the intent. "We strive to be on the of the best research/academic institutions in the country and in the world," he said. "However you define it, you tell me how you want to define it, and we ought to be there, in that group." Franek mentioned faculty credentials, quality of new programming and available majors as things to look at when determining which schools should be considered the most elite. The Princeton Review considers its "toughest to get into" list -- which ranked Penn number 17 -- to be an indication of which schools are considered the best in undergraduate education. This is the only list that is not based on student input, but instead on admission statistics. Based on that list, Franek said that Penn is not one of the top 10 in undergraduate education. However, he did say that Penn is still attracting the world's "ablest" students, as the Agenda demands. Last year, 91 percent of the students Penn accepted were among the top 10 percent of their high school class. "That's a heck of a number," Franek said. Smith agreed, emphasizing that not only are "top students" -- indicated by the elite secondary schools they attend -- deciding to apply to the University, they're deciding to enroll. While Penn was once considered "a second thought for a lot of these private school kids, [it] is now the number one choice," Smith said. Smith illustrated this using last year's matriculation numbers from Phillips Exeter Academy, the prominent New Hampshire boarding school. Twenty-one students matriculated to Penn, 20 to Harvard, 16 to Yale, 12 to Georgetown and 11 to Dartmouth. But while many talented students may be interested in Penn, the fact remains that many are not. According to Rebecca Sellers, a guidance counselor at Florida's Madison County High School, no student at her rural high school has applied to the University during her tenure. She added that there is no negative connotation associated with Penn, but her students just do not see Penn as enough of a draw to leave the state. "I think that distance is a big factor, and culture," she said And Penn is currently doing little to persuade gifted students at Madison County High School to consider Penn. "No one ever comes to our school to recruit people," Sellers said. While Sellers admitted she could not say much about Penn's academic reputation, she did note that she thought its reputation has not changed in the last five years. But Bill Farden, director of guidance at Oswego High School in central New York said he thought Penn was not in the top 10. "I don't know, top 10, that's kind of tough," he said. "University of Pennsylvania probably wouldn't be included in that group." However, he also emphasized that the whole notion of ranking schools to begin with is "absolutely asinine." "It's like taking your children and saying which one do I love the most," he said. "It's something we shouldn't do." Farden said that those students at his high school that apply to Penn can be broken down into three categories -- students looking for an Ivy League school, students looking for something in the Philadelphia area and athletes. And he noted that of those students who apply to Penn, which averages about two or three a year, most do not count the school as their first choice. But some other counselors consider Penn to be top notch. "Our students see it as one of the top schools to apply to," said Patricia Young, counselor at Bethesda Chevy Chase High School in Maryland. Despite the differing views, Smith remains proud of his alma mater. "It's always good to go to a school that's a lot better now than when you went there," he said. "And I would certainly put Penn in that category."

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