Introduction

The annual rankings of undergraduate engineering colleges in the US published by US News and World Report have become familiar to universities and to persons interested in preparation for an engineering career. These undergraduate rankings published by US News are limited to engineering colleges that award doctoral degrees.

Engineering Trends receives inquiries from organizations and individuals regarding faculty numbers, degrees and research expenditure data comparisons for the colleges included in these rankings. This report is based upon the 2006 US News rankings and faculty, degree and research expenditure data for AY2003-04, the most recent set of survey data that include all three data categories.

The 2006 rankings included 116 institutions. These were subdivided into eight groups; seven groups with fifteen colleges each and an eight group with only eleven. The groups were numbered from lowest to highest ranking. These eight groups will be compared in the graphs presented below.

Number of Faculty, Degrees and Research Expenditures

The fractions of bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees awarded in the US by each of the eight groups are shown in the graph below. Both undergraduate and graduate degree fractions decrease substantially as the ranking increases. This decline is most marked in the first few groups.

The first two groups (30 colleges) award 27.6% of the engineering bachelor's degrees in the US, 31.6% of the master's degrees and 51.0% of the doctorates. If group 3 is added, the fractions increase to 37.4%, 42.3% and 63.7%, respectively.

The same patterns for numbers of faculty and research expenditures are shown in the graph below. Research expenditure data primarily reflect support of graduate research activities by various research funding agencies. The first two groups include 29.1% of the US engineering faculty and 53.3% of the research expenditures. If the third group is included, the fractions increase to 39.0% and 66.9%, respectively.

Comparisons of Degrees and Research Expenditures per Faculty Member

The data in the two graphs above indicate that the size of the various engineering programs influences the rankings. In order to account for this effect, degrees and research expenditures were analyzed on a per capita basis. The two graphs below compare the eight groups.

All eight groups were in the range of 2.8 to 3.6 bachelor's degrees per faculty member with groups 1, 7 and 8 being lowest. Master's degrees per faculty member data exhibited some scatter due to groups 2 and 8 having higher values due to colleges with large part-time master's degree programs (probably large numbers of part-time degrees and reporting of full-time faculty). Doctoral degrees per faculty member decreased with increasing ranking.

The second graph below, as might be anticipated from the data on doctoral degrees per faculty member, shows research expenditures per faculty member decreasing continuously with increasing ranking. Group 3 expended only 64% of the research expenditures per faculty member of group 1; groups 7 and 8 expended only about 30% of the research expenditures of group 1.

Gender Comparisons - Faculty and Degrees

The graph below shows the fractions of women with engineering faculty positions in the eight groups. Groups 1 and 2 included 31.2% of all women on the faculty of engineering colleges in the US. If group 3 is included, the fraction increases to 40.2%.

It is noteworthy that the US fractions of women faculty shown in the graph below are very similar to the US fractions of total faculty shown previously. This correspondence results from very little group-to-group variation in the fraction of women on the faculty of the individual engineering colleges.

The fractions of the bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees awarded to women in US engineering colleges are shown in the graph below. An almost continuous decline with increasing ranking is shown for undergraduate and graduate degrees. For bachelor's degrees, groups 1 and 2 awarded 30.5%. If group 3 is included, the fraction increases to 40.2%. Groups 1 and 2 awarded 32.1% of the master's degrees to women. Including group 3 increases the fraction to 42.3%. For doctoral degrees, groups 1 and 2 awarded 47.8%; adding group 3 increases the fraction to 59.5%.

It is noteworthy that the trends shown in the graph below are very much the same as the trends shown previously for bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees. This similarity stems from the fact that the degree fractions (bachelor's, master's and doctoral) for women vary little from group to group.

US News Ranking Comparisons - Undergraduate Versus Graduate

The April 20, 2006 issue of US News contained the rankings (highest 50) of graduate programs in engineering. A comparison of these graduate rankings to the undergraduate rankings is shown in the graph below. Of the 50 universities, 38% had undergraduate rankings that differed by three or less from their graduate rankings and 78% were in the range of eight or less.

Summary

The 2006 US News and World Report ranking of undergraduate engineering programs in colleges that award doctoral degrees was studied by subdividing the 116 colleges into eight groups in order of increasing rank. The first seven each included fifteen universities; the eighth had only eleven. Faculty, degree and research expenditure data for each group were determined and compared. Some measures declined with increasing group ranking and some measures were essentially independent of group ranking.

The fractions of total US bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees decreased with increasing group ranking as did the fractions of these degrees awarded to women. The most significant declines occurred in the first three groups (the highest ranking 45 universities). Similar declining trends were found for faculty numbers (total and women) and research expenditures. Doctoral degrees and research expenditures per faculty member also declined with increasing group rank. The influence of graduate parameters such as doctoral degrees and research expenditures presumably contributes to the similarity of the undergraduate and graduate rankings.

This study found a few meaningful parameters that did not vary significantly with the group rankings. There was relatively little variation among the eight groups in the number of

bachelor's and master's degrees per faculty member even though doctoral degrees per faculty member decreased with increasing ranking. In addition, no significant ranking trend was found for the fraction of women holding faculty positions and the fractions of women awarded bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees.

Acknowledgments

The data used in this study originated from the annual surveys of the American Society for Engineering Education. Engineering Trends acknowledges the efforts of this organization in providing credible data and expresses its gratitude for their services to the engineering profession. Persons seeking further information about their surveys and the availability of survey data should visit the ASEE Web site (www.asee.org).

Footnote

Engineering Trends data are compiled mainly from information submitted by universities to the annual surveys of EWC and ASEE. On the very rare occasions where errors in data appear, Engineering Trends corrects the error, if possible, or deletes the data if the error is large enough to alter significantly the trend of the university or the US total.