College ranks 77th in NSF report on funding
By Conrad Scoville | October 12, 2010Although Dartmouth placed 77th among national institutions in a recent National Science Foundation report on federal research spending, the College would likely place higher in surveys that consider statistics that account for an institution's size and type like research dollars per faculty member according to faculty and staff members interviewed by The Dartmouth. The NSF report, which was released last month, only considered the raw overall numbers for science and engineering spending. "I'm virtually certain [Dartmouth] would rank higher," chemistry professor and department chair Peter Jacobi said, referring to a survey that would consider factors other than just total research spending. Dartmouth's size and the College's emphasis on undergraduate education in addition to research puts it at a disadvantage in broad measures such as the NSF report, biology professor and department chair Thomas Jack said. "The size of the research enterprise isn't the size that it is at other schools," he said. It is also important to consider the scope of the report, Jacobi said.