The Daily Beast ranks Pitt no. 20 least rigorous

A typical Thursday morning for Kasey Walls begins when her alarm goes off at 5:15 a.m.

Then… A typical Thursday morning for Kasey Walls begins when her alarm goes off at 5:15 a.m.

Then it’s a nonstop schedule of clinicals, lectures, labs and studying for her pharmacology, pathophysiology, nutrition and Foundations of Nursing class for the second-year nursing student.

“Whenever I’m not in class or doing clinicals, I’m studying,” Walls said.

But according to one publication, Walls’ Pitt workload is pretty easy. The Daily Beast, the online home of Newsweek magazine, ranked the University of Pittsburgh as number 20 on the list of “Least Rigorous Colleges.”

Patricia Beeson, Pitt’s provost and senior vice chancellor, said that she didn’t have much to say about the recently published ranking.

“Its methodology is difficult to interpret, and it may contain flawed assumptions about how to measure academic rigor,” Beeson said in an email. “What I can point out is that we are on this list with some of the highest-caliber, rigorous research institutions in the country, including UCLA, Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, Illinois, UNC, Wisconsin and the other universities cited in this study.”

U.S. News and World Reports released its rankings early Tuesday for the 2012 Best Colleges, where Pitt came in 58th, which is improved from its 64th ranking last year.

The Daily Beast ranked SUNY at Binghamton as the least rigorous school in the country. The University of Wisconsin-Madison, which has been ranked 42nd on U.S. News’ 2012 list of Best National Colleges, came in at third.

Other universities featured in the top 25 include the University of California-Berkeley, University of Southern California and George Washington University. The rankings only include the top 25 least rigorous schools.

Representatives from The Daily Beast could not be reached for comment.

Walls, who graduated from West Allegheny High School and ranked ninth out of 243 in her class, said that she was still wait-listed when she applied to Pitt.

“When I came to Pitt and began the nursing program, I realized just how intense our school is,” Walls said.

The Daily Beast’s 2011 survey, which came out in late August, rated schools that admitted students with an average SAT score of at least 1250.

The ratings took into account the universities’ freshman retention rates, student opinion, student-to-faculty ratios, the school’s average Critical Reading and Math SAT scores and RateMyProfessors.com student-posted evaluations.

According to the survey, The Daily Beast reported Pitt’s student-to-faculty ratio to be 15:1, with a 93 percent freshman retention rate. It also reported Pitt’s average SAT Critical Reading score between 570-680 and the SAT Math score between 590-680. The numbers have gone up this year though as, according to Pitt’s Office of Admissions and Financial Aid website, the average SAT Critical Reading score is between 590-700 and the SAT Math score is between 610-720 for the 2011 freshman class.

SUNY at Binghamton, the least rigorous school, has a student-to-faculty ratio of 20:1, a 90 percent freshman retention rate, an average SAT Critical Reading score between 580-660 and an average SAT Math score between 610-690, according to the survey. The most rigorous school on the top 25 list, the University of Rochester, has a student-to-faculty ratio of 11:1, a 96 percent freshman retention rate, an average SAT Critical Reading score between 590-660 and an average SAT Math score between 640-720.

“I think people still think of how Pitt used to be,” Walls said. “In the past few years it’s become much harder to get into.”

According to Pitt’s Office of Admissions and Financial Aid website, 13,541 of the 23,407 2011 freshman applicants were admitted. Pitt is categorized as a “more selective” school by the U.S. News’ survey of Best National Universities with a 57.8% acceptance rate in 2010.

Chris Kyper, a junior neuroscience major, said he finds it hard to believe that “one of the top universities in the country can also be one of the least rigorous.”

“Between labs, lectures and studying, it’s not difficult to spend more than 40 hours per week on schoolwork,” Kyper said.

Walls also said she doesn’t understand the rigor ranking, especially with all the schoolwork she does.

“If I don’t have a rigorous schedule, I don’t understand what can be considered ‘rigorous,’” said Walls, whose day can end as late as 3 a.m., depending on her workload. “It’s surprising that so many good schools made the list. I would assume that prestigious universities require students to handle rigorous workloads.”