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[Wondering]

Here is an ignorant question, perhaps:  How do you know if a university is classified R-1, R-2, etc.?  Is there a website where a university's classification can be looked up?

Thanks.

[anon]

http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/Classification/CIHE2000/PartIfiles/partI.htm

[tiers]

Where do you find the "tier" of an institution?

[BaumWelch]

There are rankings of R1 programs (like those at www.phds.org) based on surveys of faculty .  These surveys are pretty good at identifying top programs but are pretty much useless for anything beyond the top 30 or so.

A better way to tell what tier a program is to bump around it's website and look at the faculty and resources.  

Top programs will have plenty of dynamic faculty and amazing resources (not one but several wind tunnels *heavy sigh*).  The few less active faculty will be old lions full of honors and organizational responsibilities (president's committee on such and such, director of the international organization of blah blah...) .

Bottom programs will have only a few active faculty, the rest will be just counting the days till they can sail away with a full pension.  Teaching loads will be heavy and resources scarce (you want a wind tunnel, kid? *put your lips together and blow*).

[anon]

tiers are usually imagined, and they vary not just by discipline, but by subdiscipline and even as baumwelch indicates by individual people.   that said... tiers are real in many people's minds, and are very real in disciplines, especially those where individuality is not the primary system of success.  the best bet in the end is to find who you want to work with, and then ask them where they would want to go to school.

[profxfiles]

That the Carnegie categories are based on degree granting ALONE. I moved from one IIA to another IIA, but the differences in terms of salary, teaching load, research support, etc. are enormous.