A major ranking of universities has issued a methodological note so modest that only the winners noticed it, and they noticed it in time to draft a quote.
The note, published on a Tuesday after what a spokesman described as “routine review,” adjusts the weight given to reputational survey responses from peers who have been surveyed before. The adjustment is small. The consequences, for institutions that live on the difference between 47th and 41st, are not.
Several universities rose. They rose, their statements said, because of excellence, community, and in one case “a relentless focus on students,” a focus that has not, so far as this newspaper can determine, been reweighted. A university that fell issued no statement, which is also a communications strategy.
Asked whether the lunch in the headline was metaphorical, a person familiar with the calendar said that the committee does eat, that methodology is discussed when the committee meets, and that meetings occur at mealtimes because everyone involved has another job. The ranking house declined to comment on menus.
What can be stated is that the reputational survey remains a survey of reputation. Respondents are asked which institutions they respect. They respect, on the whole, the institutions they already knew they respected. The innovation this year is how much that respect counts.
A rector whose university improved by six places said the result “reflected years of quiet work.” The quiet work, according to the university’s own annual report, included a contract with a consultancy that specializes in making work less quiet to rankers. The consultancy’s brochure uses the phrase “narrative alignment.” The rector’s statement uses the phrase “organic growth.”
Methodologists outside the house, including our Prestige & Rankings desk, note that small changes in weights produce large changes in league tables when many universities are, statistically, the same university. “If you stand them in a line,” said one, “a breeze is a policy.”
Students interviewed on a quad that had been recently power-washed for a photograph said they had chosen the university before the ranking and would have to live with it after. One asked whether the cafeteria had been reweighted. It had not.
The ranking house said that methodology would continue to evolve, which is the one promise these tables have always kept. Next year’s lunch has not been scheduled. Communications offices are nonetheless on standby, drafts in a folder marked if up.