The Alumni Factor: A Revolution in College Rankings (2013-2014 Edition) Paperback – September 10, 2013

Very hard to read on a Kindle. Uses magnifying glass as many magazines do. However fonts are very light and small. You have to guess graph data graph legends even with magnifying glass moved around.

I read about this book in “How to raise an adult”, which was written by a Stanford U admissions officer. It’s all about looking at the results the school gives its alumni (how easy was it to find a job right after graduation, career earnings, friendships kept up after graduation, net worth after a certain age, etc).This is the stuff that matters much more than how selective a school is at admission. So glad I found this before my kids are making these hard decisions. I’m baffled that this book isn’t more popular!

I enjoyed reading this book. A college should not be measured solely by SAT/ACT scores,Class rankings and prestige of faculty andCurriculum. Our colleges are graduating people without the proper degrees to be competitive . This is why foreigners takeA lot off technical jobs that our collegesAre not addressing.An alumni from an IVY league schoolAfter having spent 250-300k , workingIn retail is not a good output.Bravo for the publishers of this book.At the end of the day success shouldBe measured by the alumni

First, this book apparently hasn’t been updated since 2013. Many of its data points (admissions figures, graduation rates) are “as of 2011.” Also, there are so many typos throughout that it plainly wasn’t proofread very well. Finally and most importantly, the way it presents data is confusing and not very helpful. For example, it lists the financial success of graduates not in percentages (say, 10% of graduates end up with household incomes above $150,000 per year), but simply in rank - as in this school ranks 95th of 200 in the percentage of graduates with incomes of $150,000 per year. While that might be helpful in comparing schools, it’s not all that helpful in distinguishing between them. On the whole, I found the book to be rather useless and I returned it for a refund.

This along with a few other college guides such as Choosing the Right College is a very useful reference. This is an outcomes based guide that tries to objectively measure the outcomes of various colleges and universities. It is important to realize that not all of the US colleges and universities are listed in the guide. That said, most of the higher level schools are. This guide allows the student who purchases a college education to determine its worth in terms of personal and financial development. Excellent.

It doesn't surprise me that this book isn't more popular since it is much better than the other college books out there. Even this dated version is vastly superior to the US News garbage. You will see honest rankings and surprising schools here, not the sheeple rankings. Easily worth the small amount of money for this.

This was a very helpful tool when trying to narrow down the college choices for my daughter. All the accolades in the world for a college don't help if you aren't happy upon graduation with your results.

Very informative. Purchased for two high school students ,and their parents, they love it.