Benchmark schools difficult to define

Tufts prides itself on being a contradiction. A top-notch research university with a cozy liberal arts college atmosphere, a small school where you can meet someone new every day, and a city school with a quaint New England campus. But these exact qualities which make Tufts so unique also make it exceedingly difficult to compare the University to other institutions.

But by encompassing a bit of both worlds, Tufts draws applicants from students looking for a variety of experiences, according to Dean of Students Bruce Reitman. "Students who find Tufts attractive are looking in particular for a school with all the attributes of a larger institution," he said. "While [Tufts] maintains the advantages of a school that size, you can know the name of half the people here."

The chief method that the administration uses to identify how prospective students feel about Tufts _ and therefore the public identity of the University _ is by application overlap. In this process, Tufts charts its applicants' other prospective schools and looks to see where the greatest overlap occurs. Overlapping applications are to Tufts' "cohort schools," Dean of Students Bruce Reitman said.

Once cohort schools are named, Tufts may self-evaluate based on what is known of these other schools' performances. "Application overlap is a significant piece of what makes a school compare itself to other schools," Reitman said.

This application research is gathered not only for Tufts' freshman class, but also for the applicants who choose to go elsewhere. The University wants to know "if students do not accept an offer of retention, where are they going?" Dean of Admissions David Cuttino said. In this way, the University understands the competition _ both its shortcomings and successes.

The universities which attract the most similar applicants to Tufts are Brown University, Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania, and Yale University, supporting the common claim that Tufts is a safety school for the Ivies. The list of other cohort schools includes Boston College, Boston University, Duke University, Washington University of St. Louis, Wesleyan University, New York University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Brandeis University.

Tufts has greater overlap with universities than with colleges, according to this list. Cohort schools also "tend to be small, top-notch research universities, where research is done and Ph.D.s are given," Reitman said.

College rankings printed by companies like Princeton Review and US News are typically used by the public to rank the reputation of a school, but Tufts students and administrators are hesitant to accept these evaluations.

"The rankings sell books," Reitman said. "I think taking someone else's list of schools instead of thinking of what's important to [an individual] is a mistake."

Many students were doubtful about the reliability of the rankings. "It counts things like alumni-giving percentage that aren't really important in college life," freshman Scott Burton said. "A survey would be a lot more reliable."

Reitman cautions, however, that he is hesitant to discount them completely, especially since Tufts has been doing well in these rankings. Tufts was ranked 28 this year in US News & World Report's annual "America's Best Colleges" edition, and a few years before the University broke into the Top 25.

But the environment of these cohort schools, as defined by the college application process, is not a match for the Tufts atmosphere, according to Burton. Many students characterize schools based on academic experience and athletic competition.

Tufts, in Burton's opinion, is most similar to other New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) schools _ including Tufts, Amherst, Bates, Bowdoin, Colby, Connecticut College, Hamilton, Middlebury, Trinity, Wesleyan, and Williams. This comparison was made with the distinction that Tufts is larger and closer to Boston than these other schools.

Reputation, size, and location in the Northeast are other means for comparison that students use when naming similarities between Tufts and other schools. "What separated [Tufts]...was being right next to Boston," Burton said.

Research opportunities at the University also help to distinguish it from the smaller colleges of the NESCAC. "We've got some pretty top-notch research programs," freshman Adam Buckley said.

Tufts' size helps to create a unique undergraduate experience, according to Buckley. With approximately 30 percent minorities of an undergraduate population of 4,677, Tufts has "diversity in the school population, but also in what you can do here," he said.

There are many different ways to evaluate the Tufts experience, and it may be difficult to rely on any one method, students say. Some preferred to describe Tufts as a small college in a big city with the research opportunities usually found at larger universities. Administrators played up the school's balance between a larger research university and a small liberal arts college. Ultimately, it's just a matter of opinion.