"Harvard Medical School Also Boycotts, Saying 'Can't Trust University Ranking Evaluations'"

"University Rankings Do Not Reflect Educational Aspirations"

Harvard Medical School, a prestigious institution in the United States, has decided to boycott the ranking evaluations of famous universities. Earlier, the top U.S. law schools also showed movements to reject these university rankings.

On the 17th (local time), George Q. Daily, Dean of Harvard Medical School, announced on the university's official website that "Harvard Medical School will no longer provide data for the 'Best Medical Schools' ranking survey by U.S. News & World Report." The World Report section of U.S. News has been conducting and publishing various rankings, including those of universities.

Harvard University
Photo by Getty Images Bank

Dean Daily strongly criticized U.S. News' university rankings, stating that "they have created wrong incentives due to universities reporting misleading or inaccurate data."

He also pointed out that "university rankings do not meaningfully reflect the educational excellence we aim to develop through our medical education curriculum, the preparedness of our graduates, or the noble aspirations of compassionate and fair patient care."

Dean Daily explained that Harvard Medical School has been considering boycotting university rankings for nearly six years. Recently, when a well-known U.S. law school boycotted the evaluation, he joined this "courageous and bold action." Harvard Medical School is one of the top universities, ranking first in research and ninth in healthcare in the most recent U.S. News medical school rankings.

Previously, in November last year, Yale Law School, another prestigious U.S. university, expressed its refusal to participate in the U.S. News law school rankings, citing "significant flaws" in the evaluation. Subsequently, about ten top law schools, including Harvard, joined this movement, and the 'U.S. News boycott' began to spread like wildfire within universities.

Harvard University, USA / Photo by Yonhap News

The flaw pointed out by Yale Law School in the U.S. News rankings concerns the university scoring method. Yale Law School, which has a high percentage of scholarships for low-income students and many graduates working in the public sector, is penalized in the university rankings.

Amid this situation, U.S. News issued a statement earlier this month indicating that it would "change the university ranking scoring formula."

Robert Morse, Chief Data Strategist at U.S. News, said, "We have received broad feedback that we need to place more weight on scores to reflect students' concerns about university rankings, and we strongly agree with this." He added, "We will continue to collaborate with academic and industry leaders to develop new indicators in areas such as student loan forgiveness and repayment programs, student support, diversity, and social considerations."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.