British university top rankings today
By THE DATA TEAM
WHICH university is best? Most published rankings tell you a great deal about an institution’s reputation, or how often its researchers publish in top academic journals. However, they don’t necessarily answer the question that prospective students really care about: what they have to gain by attending. For example, it is possible that graduates from the London School of Economics do well in the job market because of the university’s superior teaching. However, it is also possible that they earn so much simply because they were bright to begin with, or because they tend to choose courses that lead to lucrative careers.
To estimate which universities make the biggest positive impact on their students, we have built a statistical model that estimates how much graduates from each university can expect to earn. It is based on how selective a university is, what subjects its students study, the share of students from lower-income areas, how many students enter after age 20, what share of students attended private schools and where the university is located. We then compare these estimates of expected earnings with the actual figures. This difference, we argue, measures the value added by the institution.
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