The new Princeton Review college rankings are out. As usual, the report lists Georgetown as one of the nation’s top universities. Nothing new or surprising is mentioned. As always, ours has one of the nation’s most selective admissions standards and, as always, the University’s location in Washington, D.C. is considered one of the school’s main strengths.
So why mention the college rankings at all? Because each time rankings are published, University officials consistently talk about how they don’t focus on them?how they don’t accurately capture the school’s strengths, and how they give extra weight to certain elements, such as alumni endowment and percentage of permanent Ph.D. faculty members?both of which are traditional Georgetown weaknesses.
But here’s a better reason for University officials to ignore these ranking: They have better things to worry about?things that mean much more to students than how many of their professors hold doctorates. Students probably don’t stay up nights writing heartfelt letters to U.S. News and World Report begging its college rankers to keep Georgetown in its top 25 list. But, every now and again, they might be wondering about the following:
Why don’t laundry card machines across this campus work? Seriously, these machines have two functions: To distribute new laundry cards and to allow you to add money to existing cards. The machine inside Walsh doesn’t distribute new cards and won’t accept $1 bills. Students should be happy about living in one of the country’s best college cities but, sometimes, they’d probably just like to do their laundry without a struggle.
Why does Lauinger Library insist on having three copy machines just inside the main entrance and, invariably, at least one if not two them never work? School of Foreign Service students came to Georgetown to study international relations?as the rankings show, it’s one of the nation’s best. But it’s hard to study when you can’t copy course readings from the library.
There’s no reason why these machines aren’t working all the time. Certainly this isn’t asking very much from University officials. Certainly, a university capable of raising hundreds of millions of dollars in the span of barely three years through its Third Century Campaign can make sure that laundry card machines give students laundry cards when they’re about to do laundry.
Ignoring the rankings is a good idea, but only if University officials are doing so because they’re focused on more important, practical matters on this campus. And what’s more practical than laundry and copying services? It’s also a lot easier to call up University Facilities and Lauinger administrators than it is to “make” Georgetown better in the rankings.
Seem easy? It is. All it takes is a couple administrative phone calls and Georgetown will improve dramatically. Sure, the Princeton Review won’t care, but students will.
