High-profile athletic programs contribute to the collegiate ideal and are used by many institutions to provide connections to their internal and external constituencies. The magnitude of major athletic events contributes to and in some cases defines institutional image, even serving as a surrogate for the more intimate community-building…

Reports on the use of book reviews as selection tools to establish the reputations of publishers. Examines the quality of books of several presses, and compares each publisher against a control sample, finding discernible variations in how reviewers express themselves about books. Discusses the relationship between price and qualit,y and…

Discusses, in the context of the National Research Council's next study of research-doctorate programs, arguments over continuing use of reputational surveys as the primary measure of program quality, as opposed to more objective measures of research performance. Eleven tables rank institutions for specific fields by reputation, citation density,…

Refutes the claim that top-rated programs in library science tend to maintain and enhance their reputation by hiring their own and each other's graduates and that this pattern of inbreeding was likely to be harmful to the field. Concludes convincing evidence was not provided and the true situation may be other than claimed. (PEN)

Argues that as higher education has grown, colleges and universities have systematically disinvested in the humanities and developed a culture of credentials. Now market-driven colleges pursue trophies (star faculty, plush facilities, reputation). Academic fields that offer a promise of money, knowledge of money, or a source of money are prized,…

This exploratory study describes social workers' perceptions of the depiction of the social work profession found in the news and entertainment media. A random sample of 665 MSW social workers who were members of the Florida Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers were surveyed regarding how they felt the profession was depicted in…

We posit that institutions of higher education attempt to maximize their reputation, and that an institution's reputation, research output, and average student quality are determined simultaneously. Because these outputs are produced jointly, three-stage least squares is used to estimate the parameters of the model. We find that faculty research…

A study of high school seniors' perceptions of colleges, conducted in 1979, was replicated 23 years later. The study affords an opportunity to examine perceptual changes over time and provides an additional perspective on the positioning of colleges, apart from other well-known surveys. This information may be useful for those involved in…

Every college and university institutional advancement office would like to point to eminent alumni, living or deceased, as part of the institution's cultural legacy. However, little is known about the dynamics of how eminent alumni influence the reputations of their alma maters, particularly in the age of the internet. Has the internet created a…

The present study compared the behavioral correlates of sociometric popularity status and consensual popularity status among a large group of children (N = 778) in their first year of secondary school. By means of self-report and classmates' nomination procedures, the relative contribution of the two types of popularity to peer role strain and…

Why do some Ph.D.'s languish in positions with little authority, and what does educational background have to do with it? Hypotheses predicted that life scientists with Ph.D.'s from elite programs would be the most likely, those from middle-ranked programs the next most likely, and those from lower ranked programs the least likely to achieve…

According to the reputation enhancement theory, social bonds influence adolescents' delinquent activity indirectly through the reputations they select. Findings from the current study of a school-based sample of female adolescents indicate that bonds to parents affect reputation enhancement beliefs, which, in turn, predict delinquent activity.…

After providing a brief general framework for language policy and planning, this article examines the case of language policy and planning in Australia with a particular focus on how one of the elements in that framework, prestige planning, might contribute to successful planning implementation, thereby adding to our more general understanding of…

The Swift Trust exercise provides instructors with the opportunity to discuss the issues of managing trust and distrust perceptions in a team-based design. Lewicki, McAllister, and Bies's (1998) framework is used to allow students to experience the difficulties of deriving a common set of contract requirements based on team dynamics and…

Given that Black colleges do not fare as well in the rankings as predominantly White ones, the authors of this article sought to learn more about the MBA (master's of business administration) and post-MBA experiences of graduates of Black college MBA programs. The authors examined the factors defining success as perceived by MBA program…