天普大学将为捏造排名数据买单TempletoSettleSuitsOverFalseRankingsData

University admitted that its business school submitted fabricated statistics for years to U.S. News. Students filed a class action.

大学承认其商学院多年来向美国新闻与世界报道网提供捏造的统计数据，学生提起了集体诉讼。

Original Article by Scott Jaschik  December 21, 2018

原始文章由Scott Jaschik于2018年12月21日发表

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Temple University announced Friday afternoon that it has settled class action lawsuits from students who were outraged to learn that the business school’s top ranking for its online program was based on false data.

天普大学（Temple University）周五下午宣布，已经解决了因为发现商学院在线课程因提供虚假数据而获得靠前排名的学生所提起的集体诉讼。

The university will pay $4 million to those who are or were students in the online M.B.A. program and another $1,475,000 to settle claims of students in other M.B.A. programs and several other master’s programs and one online bachelor’s program in the business school.

该大学将向在读及已毕业于在线工商管理硕士（M.B.A.）项目的学生支付400万美元，另外1,475,000美元用于赔偿商学院的其他M.B.A.项目、其他几个硕士课程和一个在线学士课程在读的学生。

“The settlement does not constitute an admission of liability,” said a statement from the university. “While the university believes that it could have ultimately prevailed in the litigation, Temple nonetheless chose settlement in the best interests of the university and its students.”

“该和解协议不构成本校承认相关责任，”该大学的一份声明说。“虽然大学认为它最终可能会在诉讼中占上风，但Temple仍然选择了以大学及其学生的最佳利益为目标的解决方案。”

Temple also agreed, as part of the settlement, to create a $5,000 scholarship “for a student with a demonstrated interest in the study of ethics in business who is enrolled in any of the programs that are part of the settlement.”

作为和解协议的一部分，Temple还同意为一名学生提供5,000美元的奖学金，“该学生对参加协议中提到的任何一个项目的商业道德研究表现出浓厚的兴趣”。

U.S. News & World Report periodically announces that various colleges submitted incorrect data for rankings, and when those errors are material, U.S.News revokes the rankings for that year. But in many of these cases, the errors may not have been intentional or resulted in a top ranking.

美国新闻与世界报道定期宣布了多家大学提交的排名数据不正确，当这些错误很严重时，美国新闻会撤销那些学校该年度的排名。但在很多情况下，错误可能不是故意的或获得靠前的排名。

In the scandal over the Temple business school, however, the university admitted to submitting false data over several years, and those data led to the online M.B.A. program being ranked above all others for several years.

然而，在Temple商学院的丑闻中，大学承认了多年提交虚假数据，这些数据导致在线M.B.A.项目连续几年排名高于其他所有的学校。

Among the findings released by the university in July of its investigation of the falsehoods:

该大学在7月份发布的调查虚假信息的调查结果中：        

• For ranking years 2015 through 2018 (typically with data coming from the prior year’s new students), Temple’s reports that all admitted applicants had taken the Graduate Management Admission Test were wrong. The actual number was “significantly lower” than the 100 percent figure given. U.S. News asks business schools to report both GMAT and Graduate Record Exam scores (as some business school applicants take the GRE). Temple just converted GRE scores (which were supposed to be provided with breakdowns on various parts of the exam) into GMAT scores, and said that no applicants took the GRE. The Jones Day report indicated that, at one point, U.S. News raised questions about the 100 percent test-taking applicants, but did not pursue the issue when Temple provided more false information.

  对于2015年至2018年的排名（通常来自前一年新生的数据），Temple的报告称所有录取的申请人都参加了研究生管理入学考试（GMAT），这是不真实的。实际数字“明显低于”报告中所给出的100％。美国新闻要求商学院报告GMAT和研究生入学考试成绩（因为部分商学院申请者参加GRE）。 Temple将GRE分数（应该提供每个部分的成绩）转换为GMAT分数，并表示没有申请人参加GRE考试。 “琼斯日报”指出，美国新闻曾对100％考试申请人提出疑问，但当Temple提供更多虚假信息时，它并没有追究此问题。

• For ranking years 2015 through 2018, undergraduate grade point averages were “inflated through use of various methods. “One of those methods was to take GPAs listed as a 1/100 value and improving them to the “next highest” 1/10 value. As an example, the Jones Day report said that this would mean reporting 3.22 as 3.3. U.S. News asked business schools to report mean GPAs, but Temple sometimes gave the mean and sometimes reported the median (using the inflated statistics either way).

  对于2015年至2018年的排名，本科平均成绩“通过使用不同的方法进行了夸大”。其中一种方法是将GPA列为1/100值并将其提高到“次高”1/10值。例如，琼斯日报告称这意味着报告3.22为3.3。美国新闻要求商学院报告平均GPA，但Temple有时给出平均值，有时报告中位数（任何一个数值都是提高过的统计数据）。

• For ranking years 2017 and 2018, Temple underreported the number of admissions offers, implying that the program was more selective than was the case.

  对于2017年和2018年的排名，Temple报少了录取通知书的数量，暗示该项目比实际更具选择性。

• For ranking years 2016 through 2018, Temple provided false information about debt. U.S. News asks business schools for the average debt among graduates who borrow. Temple reported instead the average for all graduates, thus lowering the average debt level.

  对于2016年至2018年的排名，Temple提供了有关债务的虚假信息。美国新闻向商学院询问借款毕业生的平均债务。 Temple报告了所有毕业生的平均借款金额，从而降低了平均债务水平。

• For ranking years 2016 through 2018, Temple counted both faculty members and “academic coaches” in a formula to determine student-faculty ratio.

  对于2016年至2018年的排名，Temple把教师和“学术教练”都放在公式来计算师生比例。

Later that month, the university admitted that it had submitted false data for other programs in its business school.

那个月晚些时候，该大学承认其商学院的其他课程也提交了虚假数据。

Source 文章來源: http://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2018/12/21/temple-pays-55-million-settle-class-action-over-false-rankings-data

Counselor’s Perspective: This article highlights an issue with the U.S. News and World Report rankings (and all rankings reports, really) that is worth keeping in mind when considering these comparisons among schools: all universities are trying to find ways to give themselves an edge over others.

小助手的观点：本文突出了美国新闻和世界报道排名（以及所有排名报告，实际上）的问题，在考虑学校之间的对比时得牢记：所有大学都在努力地寻找让自己比其他学校更有优势的方法。

This is not surprising—more and more value has been placed on these rankings, especially as international applications have increased over the last ten years or so. Most international students are full-pay—meaning that they help to subsidize other important ranking factors like low-income and minority students—and drawing more of their attention to your school means having more and better choices among them. 

这并不奇怪 – 越来越多的价值被放在这些排名上，特别是随着国际申请在过去十年左右的增长。大多数国际学生都是支付全款的 – 这意味着他们有助于补助其他重要的排名因素，如低收入和少数民族学生 – 并且吸引更多国际学生关注你的学校意味着学校可以从中挑选更多更好的学生。

International students usually know far less about the schools to which they might apply than domestic students, having not grown up hearing stories, meeting graduates, or having opportunities to visit these schools. Therefore, these students put a lot more stock in comparisons among schools that are done by reputable, mostly-objective sources; and the U.S. News and World Report rankings are the most well-known of these. There is a lot of incentive for schools to fudge the numbers to make themselves more appealing to this market of students.

与当地学生相比，国际学生通常对他们所申请的学校知之甚少，没有听着学校的故事长大、会见毕业生或有机会参观这些学校。因此，这些学生在对比学校的时候更相信知名、相对客观的资源;而美国新闻和世界报道排名是其中最为人所知的。学校有很多动机来捏造这些数字，使自己更能吸引这个学生市场。

In addition, U.S. News (and other rankings institutions) makes it easy for universities to lie. As you can see in the article, they do not even pursue objectively ridiculous claims by schools, like Temple’s insistence that 100% of their students take the GMAT. That is not true for any school, and likely had a great impact on their ranking—yet U.S. News did not dig into this claim by Temple. 

此外，美国新闻（和其他排名机构）让大学撒谎变得很容易。正如你在文章中看到的那样，他们甚至没有追求学校客观荒谬的主张，比如Temple坚持认为100％的学生都参加GMAT考试。对于任何一所学校来说都不是这样，并且可能对他们的排名产生了很大的影响 – 但美国新闻没有深入研究Temple的这一说法。

This is because they make it clear that the information that they receive from universities is self-reported and un-audited. If they were to claim that all information that is used in the rankings is true and accurate, then they would be opening themselves up to lawsuits that could cost them a lot of money, and would require that they spend more money to employ more people to pursue and analyze the information that they receive.

这是因为他们明确表示他们从大学收到的信息是自我报告和未审核的。如果他们声称排名中使用的所有信息都是真实和准确的，那么他们就会让自己被起诉，这可能会花费他们很多钱，也要求他们花更多的钱雇用更多的人来追究和分析他们接收到的信息。

In the end, this article highlights facts that most people involved in admissions already know: universities are lying in their reporting to bolster their rankings, and U.S. News is doing little to prevent that from happening.

最后，本文重点讨论了很多参与招生的人已经知道的事实：大学院校在报告中作假来提升该校的排名，美国新闻在防止这种情况发生方面做得很少。

happy new year

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