1/11So, U.S. News college ranking takes baby steps towards recognizing role of higher ed in promoting social mobility. usnews.com/info/blogs/pre… Good as far as it goes, but only about 2% far enough. U.S. colleges are ruthless class-sorting machines: equality-of-opportunity.org/documents/ 
2/11 @Princeton is No. 1 in U.S. News ranking, after introducing new social mobility measures. But Princeton takes v few kids from even bottom 60% (v. top 20%) in the first place:
3/11 The new social mobility factors are % Pell-eligible and graduation rates of Pell-eligible v. rest. Good, but still only 5% of the overall formula (via @ScottJaschik ihenow.com/2x3oVcm)
4/11 There has been no discernable upward movement in very low % of students from bottom 20% households by income (via Chetty at al:
5/11 Pell-eligible is not the optimum way to measure access, better (like Chetty et al) to use simple household income measures like quintiles:
6/11 U.S. News ranking has kept average SAT score as a factor (albeit weighted slightly lower) but SAT tightly correlated to family income, so this upweights colleges who take lots of rich kids (data via @CollegeBoard):
7/11 Good news: they’ve ditched acceptance rates as a factor in the ranking (which encouraged mass application to get mass rejections). But small beer, just 1.25 of the score.
8/11 Side note: even these small steps only made possible because Fed Gov under President Obama mandated data on Pell-eligible students to be shared. Data access and sharing really really really really really really really matters. thehill.com/opinion/financ…
9/11 Really, we need longer-run outcomes than just graduation. How do kids from poorer backgrounds far later in life? Remember @hershbein’s findings that degrees are worth less, on average, to poor kids brook.gs/2bd7HQ7
10/11 Also, we need to focus not just on poor kids, but on middle class kids (middle 60%) too, who largely go to community colleges and accessible 4-years, like these Mountain West colleges brook.gs/2sNFAig
11/11 Bottom line: The @usnews college ranking just got slightly less horrible, in terms of incentivizing colleges to become Great Equalizers, rather than (as now) acting as Great Stratifiers. Must do better! amazon.com/dp/081572912X/…
