University of Maryland, College Park

Can anyone tell me how reputable this school is? Is it widely known? How does it compare with California State Universities?

 

Maryland is significantly more prestigious than any of the CSU campuses, being ranked #55 nationally by USN&WR.

 

UMCP vs. UC & CSU

The University of Maryland is the "first-tier" public university system in the State of Maryland. The College Park campus is the main campus in the system, and it has a national reputation. It is the top public university in the State of Maryland, and in the Baltimore-Washington metro area.

By California standards, the University of Maryland-College Park would be comparable to the "first-tier" University of California system, rather than to the "second-tier" California State University system. According to the widely-known US News and World Report (USNWR) rankings, Maryland ranks #55 among "National Universities". This puts it behind most of the UC campuses (#20 UC Berkeley, #25 UCLA, #32 UC San Diego, #40 UC Irvine, #45 UC Santa Barbara, and #48 UC Davis), but ahead of a few (#68 UC Santa Cruz, #85 UC Riverside).

The CSU schools are not regarded as "National Universities" by USNWR; they are ranked separately as "Western Master's Universities." Most CSU degrees would be regarded as significantly less prestigious than UC or UMCP degrees. Some particularly strong CSU programs, like Cal Poly engineering, would arguably be competitive.

 

USNews is employing the Carnegie classifications.

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

The Carnegie foundation classifies American higher education institutions by the kind of degrees they grant. But the Carnegie foundation doesn't suggest that universities that grant lots of doctorates are somehow better across the board, at the bachelors and masters level, than schools that don't.

USNews suggests that if a university awards more than some arbitrary number of doctoral degrees a year, that it is somehow "national". And they suggest that if schools don't, they are inferior schools that are only of "regional" interest. That's ridiculous in my opinion, particularly since the USNews rankings are of undergraduate divisions, not the doctoral programs.

But having said that, I do agree that the University of Maryland at College Park does seem to be more selective, to have higher freshman SATs etc, than most of the CSU campuses. I'd be more inclined to compare it with one of the UCs on that undergraduate selectivity basis.

But I wouldn't say that about UMUC, which is where most of the University of Maryland system's DL programs actually come from, as I understand it.