Why Quality Counts

Washington citizens, when told that the University of Washington is one of the nation's leading research universities, can reasonably ask two basic questions: How do we know? Why should we care?

Many different yardsticks measure the quality of the UW: Students on Suzzallo
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In the National Research Council's latest study of Ph.D. programs, the UW ranked 7th among public universities and 17th among all universities. Two UW programs (bioengineering and oceanography) were ranked 3rd in the nation in their fields, and nine other programs were among the top ten in their fields.
Every year since 1974, the UW has won more federal research funds--awarded competitively to faculty projects--than any other public university. In recent years it has ranked second among all universities.
UW undergraduates consistently earn top national scholarships. In 1996 and 1998, three of the four UW students nominated won Goldwater Scholarships, the most prestigious national award for undergraduate scientists; in 1997 all four UW nominees won Goldwaters, a record matched by only five other schools in the nation.
For the fifth consecutive year, U.S. News & World Report ranked the UW School of Medicine #1 in primary-care medical training. Seven medical specialties ranked among the top five such programs in the nation. In this survey as in others, the School of Nursing is perennially #1.
The UW faculty includes the only four Nobel Prize-winners in the Northwest, three winners of the National Medal of Science, seven MacArthur Fellows, 38 members of the National Academy of Sciences--and holders of other honors that would fill several pages.

What does the state of Washington stand to gain from these rankings and honors?

It gains, first, world-class opportunities for its brightest and most ambitious sons and daughters. Without leaving the Northwest and without crippling expense (annual resident tuition for 1998-99 is $3,486), these students can educate themselves to their full potential and earn degrees that command respect everywhere. Strong demand for UW admission shows that students and their families recognize those opportunities. Last year, more than 6,900 students earned UW bachelor's degrees; almost 90 percent of them were Washington residents.

Both the New York Times and the "Today Show" have featured the work of UW neuroscientist Patricia Kuhl (left). Infants, she has found, begin to learn language much earlier than we knew, and the spoken words they hear actually shape the development of their brains. Kuhl heads the department of speech and hearing sciences, which U.S. News & World Report recently ranked third in the nation. The department's research feeds directly into its Speech and Hearing Clinic, where speech- and hearing-impaired patients receive treatment based on the latest findings.

Some three-quarters of UW graduates stay in Washington, giving back to the state not only their native talents and abilities, but also the fruits of their UW education. By ensuring the quality of that education, the state invests in the quality of its human resources. At a truly distinguished university, minds are expanded, possibilities glimpsed, ambitions kindled--and students emerge to build and lead their communities.

All this holds true as well for high-quality graduate and professional programs. Graduate students from around the country and the world come to the UW to study with its high-profile faculty. Last year, more than 15,000 students applied for fewer than 2,500 places in UW graduate programs (not including professional schools like law and medicine). Many of those students, too, choose to remain in the Northwest, adding their distinctive abilities and specialized training to the state's resources.

The UW creative writing program garnered its second and third MacArthur ("genius") Fellowships in 1998--awarded to poet Linda Bierds, who heads the program, and novelist (and National Book Award winner) Charles Johnson. Poet Richard Kenney received the award in 1987. U.S. News & World Report, in 1997, ranked the UW program 10th among 200 graduate writing programs nationally. For decades, the UW program has helped make the Seattle area a national center of literary activity. But its influence extends beyond professional writers. Faculty in the program teach scores of undergraduates each year, pushing them to tap their creative powers and hone their writing. In any setting, these are skills of life-long value.

UW research--the work of these graduate students and their faculty mentors--is another major resource for the state.

The School of Social Work, ranked sixth in the nation, tries out its theories about preventing adolescent violence in Washington schools and communities. When those theories work, Washington reaps the first rewards.
Researchers in the nationally third-ranked department of oceanography ply their trade along the Washington coast and in the waters of Puget Sound. What they learn has direct application to state problems and policies.
Washingtonians were the first to have access to life-saving kidney dialysis and 911 emergency services--because the research was done here in the UW medical school.
Psychology professor John Gottman, whose findings about marital relationships and violence made national news, runs the nation's only "marriage laboratory," where he studies and counsels Washington couples.

"Climate is what you expect; weather is what you get." UW scientists from several disciplines have led research that brings increased understanding and--predictability--in both realms. David Battisti (atmospheric sciences) was the first to explain the four-year cycles of El Niño. He and his colleagues have now identified a longer-term climatic pattern called the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). They expect to learn enough over the next few years to begin making PDO forecasts, which would allow long-term regional planning in such areas as fisheries, water supplies, agriculture, and energy production. Meanwhile, other UW researchers are experimenting with small, robotic aircraft to improve weather reconnaissance over the Pacific--before the storms hit Washington.

In these and countless other instances, the state itself is the laboratory, proving ground, and beneficiary of UW research. The quality of that research--the quality of UW expertise on a whole host of political, social, medical, and environmental issues--has real consequences for the quality of life in Washington.

UW quality also has economic impacts on the state.

Millions of federal research dollars flow into Washington's economy by way of UW grants and expenditures. Federal grants awarded to UW faculty for fiscal 1998 totaled $422 million.
UW discoveries and inventions create new jobs and whole new companies: at last count, UW-related start-up companies totaled 105, including 24 in 1997 alone.
The total economic impact of the University on the state for fiscal 1997 has been calculated at $3.6 billion--from total state support of only $378 million. By the same calculation, the UW generated more than 38,000 jobs that year in addition to its own FTE payroll of 22,636 (only about 5,500 funded by the state).
The state of Washington now leads the nation in the percentage of its workforce employed in technology-related industries. Roughly a third of all jobs in the state depend directly or indirectly on the high-tech sector. These are good jobs, future-oriented, with above-average pay. Is this all due to the UW? Of course not. Could it have happened, and can it be sustained, without excellence in related UW programs? Highly unlikely.

These are some of the answers to the question posed above: Why should Washingtonians care about having a top-ranked university? Any public university is a public asset. But the value of that asset grows exponentially with its quality.

1998 Report to the State Previous Next