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  3. When U. S. News started the college and university rankings 25 years ago, no one imagined that these lists would become what som

When U. S. News started the college and university rankings 25 years ago, no one imagined that these lists would become what som

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问题     When U. S. News started the college and university rankings 25 years ago, no one imagined that these lists would become what some consider to be the 800-pound gorilla of American higher education, important enough to be the subject of doctoral dissertations, academic papers and conferences, endless debate, and constant media coverage. What began with little fanfare has spawned imitation college rankings in at least 21 countries, including Canada, China, Britain, Germany, Poland, Russia, Spain, and Taiwan.
    Today, it’s hard to imagine there ever was a void of information to help people make direct comparisons between colleges, but such was the case in 1983 when we first ventured into the field. The editors back then, led by Marvin L. Stone, thought the project was worth attempting because a college education is one of the most important—and most costly—investments that people ever make.(Of course, that perspective is even more relevant today when the price of an undergraduate education at some private universities hovers in the $200,000 range.)So the magazine designed a survey and sent it out to 1,308 college presidents to get their opinions of which schools offered the best education. The winners: Stanford(National Universities)and Amherst(National Liberal Arts Colleges).
    That academic-reputation-only method was repeated in 1985 and 1987. In 1988, we started to use statistical data as part of the ranking methodology, evaluating those numbers along with the results of the survey. In 1997, in another pioneering step, the America’s Best Colleges rankings made the leap online at usnews. com. The online version, viewed by millions, has substantially more information and extended rankings than there is room for in the magazine.
    Of course, we’ve changed the ranking formula over the years to reflect changes in the world of higher education. In general, the biggest shift has been the move toward evaluating colleges less by the quality of the students they attract(inputs)and more by the success the school has in graduating those students(outputs). We operate under the guiding principle that the methodology should be altered only if the change will better help our readers compare schools as they’re making decisions about where to apply and enroll.
    Higher education’s response. It helps to have this principle to focus on when the inevitable criticisms of the rankings and their influence arise. Chief among the criticisms is the idea that it is impossible to reduce the experience that any given college has to offer to a number on a list. A fair enough observation, but one that does little to help the student who will have to choose just one to attend. Another criticism of the rankings is that they often substitute as a sort of performance evaluation measure for the school and its employees. U. S. News is keenly aware that the higher education community is also a major audience and consumer of our rankings. We understand how seriously academics, administrators, and governing boards study and analyze our rankings and how they use them in various ways, including benchmarking, alumni fundraising, and advertising to attract students.
After the birth of the college rankings,
选项 A、most of the people believed it would become important in the future.
B、it became one of the subjects in academic fields.
C、only a few countries imitated the college rankings.
D、less than 21 countries imitated the college ranking, including Canada and Italy.
答案B
解析 事实细节题。由题干关键词college rankings定位至第一段。根据第一段第一句…no oneimagined that these lists would become what some consider to be the 800一pound gorilla of Americanhigher education可知，没有人认为大学排名会变得很重要，因此[A]错误；根据后面的…importantenough to be the subject of doctoral dissertations，academic papers and conferences，endless debate，and constant media coverage．可知，大学排名变成了学术界的主题，因此[B]正确；根据第二段第二句可知，有很多国家效仿了大学排名，因此[C]错误；效仿的国家数是至少21个，而不是不到21个，而且这些国家不包括意大利，因此[D]错误。
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