The Top American Research Universities - The Center for ...

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discipline are coded as “all.” We identify institutions with 75-94%
in one area as “heavy” and label those with 50-74% of their
expenditures concentrated as “strong.” Other universities with
25-49% in one or more disciplines we describe as “moderate.”
A few institutions (but none in the more than $20 million group)
have expenditures distributed fairly evenly across the disciplines;
those we code as “mixed.”
In some cases, where an institution reports as a multi-campus
entity, we made adjustments to break out the discipline-level
expenditure data by single campus. Typically, this involved moving
all or a portion of the life sciences expenditures to the health
or medical center campus. IPEDS fall enrollment and graduate
degrees by discipline data also were used to help in this effort.
While these data offer some insight as to the research structure
of a university, their usefulness is limited. For example, we
may be tempted to use the life sciences as a surrogate for medical
research, but we must remember that they also include agricultural
and biological sciences. Further, the growing trend toward
multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary projects may make it more
difficult for universities to accurately reflect expenditures by
discipline or sub-discipline. The Center chooses not to break out
these sub-disciplines because the data are increasingly prone to
error as further adjustments are made.
Student Characteristics
Fall Enrollment
Source: NCES IPEDS Fall Enrollment Survey, 2006.
Each November, institutions report their current fall headcount
enrollment to the IPEDS Fall Enrollment Survey. Enrollment
figures include both degree seeking and non-degree seeking students.
The Center provides the headcount enrollment by level as
presented by IPEDS, along with the percentage of those attending
part-time. Graduate students include those seeking specialist
degrees in engineering and education. First professional students
The Center for Measuring University Performance
The Top American Research Universities
include those seeking degrees in medical fields, such as Chiropractic,
Dentistry, Medicine, Optometry, Osteopathic Medicine,
Pharmacy, Podiatry, and Veterinary Medicine, as well as those
seeking degrees in Law and Theology.
Each campus in our study submits enrollment data by campus,
except for the few institutions identified in our Data Notes
section. Because this is an informational item and not one of
The Center’s nine quality measures, we did not attempt to adjust
these figures.
AAMC Federal Research
Source: Association of American Medical Colleges
The Association of American Medical Colleges data on federally
sponsored research at medical colleges through the Liaison
Committee on Medical Education (LCME) Part I-A, Annual Financial
Questionnaire. We calculate each medical school’s federal
R&D by summing the recorded dollars and a portion of the relative
administrative costs. We exclude the not-recorded dollars.
1 Academic R&D Expenditures, FY 2000: Technical Notes
(On-line: http://www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs/nsf02308/secta.htm)
2 National Patterns of R&D Resources, 1998: Technical Notes
(On-line: http://www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs/nsf99335/appa.htm
3 College and University Higher Education Price Index, 2005
Update, Research Associates of Washington, Washington, DC.
4 National Patterns of R&D Resources, 1998: Technical Notes
(On-line: http://www.nsf.gov/sbe/srs/nsf99335/appa.htm)
5 Survey Methodology: Survey of Graduate Students
and Postdoctorates in Science and Engineering (On-line:
http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/srvygradpostdoc/)