and heavily graduate school based. A lot of emphasis seems to go on professor standing (top salary, level of degree and number of research papers). I also noticed they even place emphasis on the number of international graduate and undergraduate students in their formula. Like most rankings (maybe all), it is flawed and doesn't clearly represent the undergraduate academic quality of universities. If I had my rankings, I'd include alumni job placement quality, the average salary of alumni after 10 and 30 years, NSF Research rankings, and 4 year graduation rates. I'd also place more emphasis on STEM than liberal arts (maybe something like a 60:40).

IMHO, Virginia Tech is just as good an academic institution as Maryland, Utah, Colorado, Iowa, Michigan State, Rutgers, Miami (FL), and probably better than 20-30 of those P-5 schools that are listed above Tech. I know for a fact that any Tech grad can hold his/her own against any graduate of any Big 10 or Pac 12 land-grant school. I was an average Tech student and performed as well as any Penn State, UMCP, Ohio State, Purdue, Rutgers, Michigan State, ... in the workplace. From those rankings, Tech needs increase professor salaries and bring in more international students. Maybe open up a campus in China too. ;)