TheCenter The Top American Research Universities

Data NotesThe raw data used for The Top American ResearchUniversities project—obtained from federal agenciesand national organizations—often contain informationon single-campus institutions, multiple-campusinstitutions, and state university systems, withoutclearly identifying the distinctions. This makes nationalcomparisons difficult and unreliable.To increase the validity and usefulness of thesedata, TheCenter adjusts the original reported figures,when necessary, to ensure that all data represent thestrength of a single-campus institution. TheCenterbases its adjustments on information gathered fromthe reporting agency or from the university itself.In cases where the published data represent a singlecampus, we do not adjust the data. When the datarepresent more than one campus, we first attemptto obtain a figure directly from the National ScienceFoundation (NSF) (for research expenditures andpostdoctorates), from the institution itself, or fromthe university system office that submitted the data.If unavailable from those primary sources, we use anestimated or substitute figure derived from informationfound on the institution’s Web site. As a lastresort, we use prior-year data as a substitute.If the institution provides an estimate representingat least 97% of the originally published figure, wecredit the full amount to the main campus. Otherwise,we use the estimate provided by the institution.TheCenter does not adjust the private universitydata because of multi-campus or system-wide reporting.We treat all private universities in this studyas single-campus institutions because, while somemay have multiple campuses, they are generally in oraround a single city and considered an integral partof the main campus. Furthermore, private institutionsgenerally do not break out their data by regional,branch, or affiliated campus as often happens withpublic institutions.The following tables outline the various adjustmentsor substitutions that we made to the originaldata. The tables list institutions alphabetically andinclude both private and public universities. For thepurpose of this report, we provide notes for institutionswith more than $20 million in fiscal year 2003federal research. Data notes for all other researchuniversities are available on TheCenter Web sitehttp://thecenter.ufl.edu.The Top American Research Universities 2005 Page 237