Holy Cross President Vincent Rougeau: National Rankings Don’t Fully Explain What Colleges Offer

The U.S. News & World Report rankings, long a major influencer in higher education, have been facing a growing opposition within law and medical schools that are refusing to participate due to equity concerns, with the rankings favoring wealth and prestige. Will the uprising spread to undergraduate schools? 

In a recent interview with The Boston Globe’s Hilary Burns, Holy Cross President Vincent Rougeau argues that rankings don’t “fully explain what we do or what we offer.” However, for a wave of undergraduate programs to rebuke them, it would need to start with the top-ranked schools, according to Rougeau. 

“The rankings of the top schools never really change. They’re the foundation of the whole system,” he said. “If they don’t participate, it makes it much harder to justify other schools being a part of this.”

To read the article, go to BostonGlobe.com. 

Full disclosure: College of the Holy Cross was ranked 33rd among national liberal arts colleges in the 2022 U.S. News & World Report rankings.