Every year my alma mater prouding announces its placement in the US News ranking of the top colleges in the midwest. This year they placed 16th.
A year ago they changed the name from "Huntington College" to "Huntington University." The argument was that a number of other schools were adopting the "university" label, and there seemed to be solid data that the "university" tag would increase the school's stature in people's minds. And maybe it does. I'm not sure it makes much diff to US News. Only 10 of the top 50 schools, and only 2 of the top 10, have the "university" label. I just found that interesting.
Career-wise, I've been hanging around and writing about and cheering on churches and pastors for the past 25 years as my denomination's Communications Director.
As a recent HC graduate and a frequent lurker on your blog I just have to comment on this post. Now that I attend a big land grant university I wonder how many of the people behind the name change idea have actually spent time at a big university and know what sort of images that name conjures; research facilities, open admissions, huge classes, drinking, providers of credentials not education, and professors who care more about research than students come to my mind. Huntington is none of these things and does itself a disservice by posing in such a light. I'm proud of graduating from a small liberal arts college with an education and not just a degree. I wish the powers that be would quit apologizing for what Huntington is and start promoting it.