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Almost every student and parent goes through college rankings before choosing one. Today, with so many ranking systems, they are also questioning their validity. According to critics, most of the ranking lists cannot be trusted as the data used for this purpose is provided by the schools. The ranking systems do not actually check the facts.

No mathematical formula can give a true picture of campus accessibility, culture, academic and teaching qualities. Students who decide on the college based on these rankings often make wrong decisions and have to learn an expensive lesson.

Colleges that do not earn high marks are shunned by most parents. Look around and you will find many colleges using these rankings as a part of their advertisement strategy. The trend today is that higher the ranking, higher the number of achieving students, bragging rights and academic prestige.

Economics professor from Wake Forest University, Amanda Griffith says that in order to enhance their standing, certain schools create policies. Data is manipulated by them in any way they want to. While students continue to choose high ranked colleges, colleges continue to be desperate to be ranked high.

In the year 2008, we saw a desperate Texas based Baylor University getting already admitted students to take the SAT test again to boost their average ranking. According to the American Institutes for Research vice president Mark Schneider, there is a lot of pressure on schools to manipulate data. Only if schools are ranked in the top 20 can they attract the best students from across the country.

There are people who defend this system and say that families find it easy to compare schools only because of these rankings. One of the most popular sources people utilize to check for ranking is the US News and World Report though there are many other prominent ranking groups such as Princeton, Kiplinger and Forbes reviews.

Rankings are done based on many factors such as environment policies, most-wired campuses and cafeteria food. These rankings are offered with the only intention of providing authentic information to help students and parents make an informed choice.

Rankings are also calculated by these groups based on test scores, per-student spending and faculty salaries. Prominent and popular ranking groups say that there is no scope for cheating as they always cross check information with various sources to ensure optimum accuracy.

While financial aid, admissions and tuition data is checked against statistics worked out by the National Center for Education, information on faculty salaries is cross verified with the AAUP or American Association of University Professors.

According to these highly regarded ranking groups, there is always margin for error. They say that if a college decides to cheat on statistics, it is hard to catch them. A metro Atlanta based private counsellor Joni Towles says that almost every American family depends on college rankings to make a choice.

Not all colleges unscrupulously try to boost their rankings. There are schools that take positive measures to boost results. They improve performance by increasing student merit aid, institute smaller classes, hike faculty salaries and increase standard for admission.

It is indeed a challenging task for parents and students today to choose the right ranking system and make an informed decision.