A drop in a collegeâs ranking could cost that school millions of dollars, according to a prominent higher-education expert.
Robert Kelchen, a professor who heads the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Tennessee, said Tuesday that lower rankings do equate to a decline in the number of applications a school receives. In turn, schools must try to make up for that by offering accepted applicants better financial-aid packages as an inducement to attend.
Colleges that suffer a rankings hit âare having to spend more money to get the students they want,â Kelchen told MarketWatch. He noted that the additional outlay could reach into not just the millions but tens of millions of dollars.
Kelchenâs comments came after the U.S. News & World Report released its much-watched annual rankings of universities and colleges on Monday. While Princeton held on to its No. 1 ranking among universities, the big news was that fellow Ivy League university Columbia dropped from No. 2 to No. 18.
The change in Columbiaâs ranking followed a scandal in which the school admitted to reporting inaccurate data for previous U.S. News annual rankings.
Kelchen isnât the only one to have observed how rankings affects a schoolâs profile, applicant pool and finances. A 2014 study from the American Educational Research Association found that âmaking the U.S. News rankings list is associated with an increase in applicationsâ and pointed to similar results with other rankings.
Still, Kelchen noted that schools in the top tier â say, ranked 1-20 â are not severely affected by a slight upgrade or downgrade. He also notes that such schools have hefty endowments and are not going to feel too great a pinch if they have to spend those extra millions.
The Columbia situation is different in that itâs a major downgrade. But Kelchen expects the school will be able to put the scandal behind it. âItâs a black eye theyâll have to recover from, but next year thereâs no way theyâll rank 18th,â he told MarketWatch.
Columbia didnât respond to a MarketWatch request for comment.