Continued from page 70
The safety of
American children
attending overseas
schools is of vital
concern to the State
Department.
A Different Kind of College Ranking
In September, Washington Monthly will unveil its 2009 “Annual College Guide,”
a new and improved version of the post-secondary education survey that sorts
schools according to what they give to society (
www.washingtonmonthly.com/
college_guide/ ).
Prospective college students and their parents will want to bookmark this site to
have at their fingertips this very helpful alternative to the traditional “best” college
rankings issued annually by U.S. News& World Report and other organizations.
Five years ago, Washington Monthly concluded that the public would be better
served with more and different types of school rankings. The WM annual guide
ranks schools’ performance as engines of social mobility, as producers of the scientific minds and research that develop new knowledge and drive economic growth,
and as promoters of an ethic of service.
“While other guides ask what colleges can do for students, we ask what colleges are doing for the country,” the magazine’s editors stated in the introduction
to their 2005 inaugural guide.
In the 2007 WM guide, only Stanford shows up in the top 10. And among the
Ivies, only Cornell figures in its top 25, thanks to the large number of graduates
who earn a Ph.D. or join the Peace Corps. The elite schools’ “abysmal” record of
taking on and graduating poorer students is one of the reasons they don’t do well,
reports WM. The guide also surveys the country’s best community colleges.
— Susan Maitra, Senior Editor
seas; helping parents locate schools
offering programs for children with
special needs; briefing ambassadors,
DCMs or management officers on
educational issues at post; or arranging for an educational consulting specialist to visit a school.
Twice a year the REOs travel
around their regions to meet with
parents and embassy officers to discuss educational issues at post, visit
the schools attended by U.S. government dependents and meet with
school boards and administrators.
A Wealth of Information
In the 2008-2009 academic year,
the State Department assisted 196
schools, and A/OPR/OS publishes a
one-page fact sheet on each of them.
The office also compiles a CD-ROM
of detailed reports on more than 500
preschools, elementary schools and
secondary schools. These backgrounders bring together information
on course offerings, special programs,
programs for children with special
needs, extracurricular activities, graduation requirements, etc.
This information is available from
the Community Liaison Officer at
each post and on the A/OPR/OS intranet site. Copies of the CD-ROM
