(This Commentary ran in The Philadelphia Inquirer Dec. 3, 2003

By John Strassburger, Ursinus College President
        In the rush to complete college applications and meet this year's deadlines, high school students and their parents are paging through guides analyzing and ranking colleges.

        Most educators agree that the existing methods of stacking up colleges against each other are shallow and misleading, creating false distinctions in many cases. Yet the guidebooks sell so well because the public wants information to help them make their all-important decision.

        There is a study of American higher education that truly matters. The National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) measures the level of academic challenge at different institutions and the level of student engagement with learning and the world of ideas. Unfortunately, this study is not sold on newsstands or in bookstores,  even though it is based on data from 185,000 college students at 648 different U.S.  colleges and universities. The results are based on the best research, by the nation's best educational researchers, on what matters in getting the best college education possible.

        The student engagement survey has its critics, to be sure, but as its most recent national report, released last month, shows, it has produced meaningful change at many institutions. Its data gets much less hoopla than the U.S. News & World Report rankings, for example; NSSE does not release to the public data comparing one institution to the next.

        Data from each of the participating institutions are sent only to the individual schools. The NSSE tells institutions how their students' answers on survey questions - ranging from how the campus environment supports academic success to the quality of relationships with faculty - compared with averaged data from the other institutions across the country.

        Parents and high school students interested in the actual quality of education at a given institution should ask administrators how it did on the student engagement survey: How challenging academically is the institution, compared to others? How much interaction is there outside of class between faculty and students? How enriching is the overall educational environment? Any college that participated in NSSE will have the answers.

        The NSSE has gone a step further. Its researchers have singled out 20 institutions for exemplary educational practices. The list includes the Universities of Michigan and Kansas among state flagships, as well as Macalester College in St. Paul, the University of the South in Tennessee, and my own college, Ursinus, so that a team can explore what strong-performing colleges and universities do to promote student success. What the list of 20, called DEEP - Documenting Effective Educational Practices - tells us is something absolutely critical to anyone thinking about getting a college education. The rankings and the insider guides may tell you something about the age of an institution or its level of partying or both, but the real question is: what is the nature of the educational experience?. Does the campus environment emphasize studying? Does the coursework emphasize synthesis, and the making of judgments, and the application of theories to new problems or situations? These are the questions that matter when it comes to getting an education.

        The national ranking lists may be so popular because they are easy to use, but there should be no short cuts to finding a challenging education. Anyone can, and should, ask of each college whether it has data to show that it excels at crafting environments that encourage student achievement at the highest possible levels. The practices of the 20 DEEP schools could readily be used as benchmarks; many of these best practices exist at other institutions as well.

        Despite the hype of all those eager to sell their lists, the key for those interested in choosing a college is to remember that the guides and the rankings do not measure quality. And even more important, for those interested in obtaining a first-rate education -  a powerful and transforming education - the real key is to look past the guides and the rankings to the student experience instead.

        John Strassburger is president of Ursinus College in Collegeville.