Is the B1G the Gateway into the AAU??
Nebraska joined the Big 10 and then got kicked out of the AAU. Had the Big 10 schools supported them, as ALL the Big 12 schools did, they would still be AAU But their Big 10 partners voted them out.
AAU has nothing to do with conference membership. The reverse is, however, partly true. AAU schools like other AAU schools in their conference, all other things being equal.
Schools decide academic partnerships without any regard to conference membership. Below is a link to the Giant Magellan Telescope project as an example. Partners included Harvard, Chicago, Texas, Texas A&M, Arizona and Arizona St. along with others. Out of that group only the Arizona schools were in the same conference.
https://giantmagellan.org/founders/
IIRC, only two B1G members -- Michigan and Wisconsin -- voted to expel Nebraska. The current and former Big XII AAU members -- Colorado, Iowa State, Kansas, Missouri, Texas and Texas A&M -- all supported Nebraska because they feared a similar expulsion vote as to themselves (maybe not Texas.). As it was, Iowa State later resigned from the AAU rather than face a similar expulsion vote.
It’s probably not a gateway because, as other have pointed out, other conferences have AAU members who aren’t candidates for the B1G. With that said, the Big Ten represents 1/3rd of the votes needed to admit AAU new members. Add Johns Hopkins and you’ve got 35% of the total votes needed to add new AAU members. The bar for B1G membership is set at a level that makes AAU membership sort of pro forma. (Sorry, Nebraska.)
I get tired of this falsehood repeated. The AAU is indifferent to the topic of research. What they don't count is research that is not competitively awarded. Most agricultural research is funded without competition.
There may not be a magic bullet, but there is one big disqualifier.
Of the top 25 in US News' national survey, 24 are in AAU, in fact, of the top 35, 34 are in. Despite over $300 million in annual research (more than 15 other AAU schools): Georgetown University is not in AAU and may likely never get into AAU for one reason: no engineering program.
Of the 71 AAU schools, 70 have engineering programs (Oregon does not but was grandfathered in over 50 years ago) FWIW, Georgetown has almost twice the research expenditures as Oregon, but that's not going to be good enough.
https://www.on3.com/boards/threads/fsu-and-the-aau.976561/#post-17219612
Also, I posted this one another thread:
National Science Foundation - Rankings by total R&D expenditures:
Florida State U. #83 9.9 $328,604,000*
Clemson U. #107 12.6 $237,485,000
*Note: FSU was $356,000,000 for 2022.
Note:
U. South Florida #68 8.3 $405,088,000
U. Miami #75 9.1 $375,84,000
U. Notre Dame #106 12.4 $240,324,000
..
Based on the above, assuming R&D expenditures are a big factor, maybe FSU is closer to AAU membership than we think.
AAU institutions:
U. Missouri, Columbia 71 8.6 388,77
U. Kansas 72 8.7 385,637
Dartmouth C. 82 9.8 330,226
Brown U. 96 11.4 276,331
SUNY, Stony Brook U. 98 11.6 274,516
George Washington U., The 101 11.9 266,108
U. California, Santa Barbara 104 12.2 248,961
Tufts U. 110 12.9 224,956
Tulane U. 119 13.9 205,206
U. California, Riverside 133 15.4 189,600
U. California, Santa Cruz 142 16.4 160,615
U. Oregon 149 17.1 139,193
Brandeis U. 165 18.9 107,549
Note: I would think the following would also be strong AAU candidates:
North Carolina State U. 53 6.7 547,118 (#72 US News)
VaTech: 54 6.8 542,045 (#62 US News)
UGA: 57 7.1 493,944 (#49 US News)
In fact, it is puzzling to me how a USF got in the AA over the above schools. Very odd. I wonder what the story is there.
In fact, why in the world isn't UGA an AAU school?
Per the AAU site, it's based on federal research, not total research. They also consider per-faculty measures, so even if a university does less research than FSU, they still might be "weighted" higher due to being a smaller school with less faculty.
AAU Membership Indicators
The AAU presidents and chancellors have adopted the following set of membership indicators to use in assessments of the U.S. current and potential new members. All indicators will be tabulated as both actual values and normalized, per-faculty measures where feasible.
Phase I Indicators
- Competitively funded federal research support: The Membership Committee uses National Science Foundation (NSF) research expenditure data, excluding formula-allocated USDA research expenditures. Funding for the Agriculture Food and Research Initiative (AFRI), a competitively funded USDA research support program, is included in the Phase I research support indicator.
AAU MEMBERSHIP INDICATORS: Data Sources
Phase I Indicators
Competitively funded federal research support: federal R&D expenditures
A ten-year average of federal research expenditures (including S&E and non-S&E) adjusted to exclude USDA formula-allocated research expenditures. This indicator includes obligations for the AFRI program funded by USDA. Expenditures for Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab were excluded.
- National Science Foundation (NSF) Survey of Research and Development Expenditures at Universities and Colleges/Higher Education Research and Development Survey (HERD), data for the most recently available ten-year average. Table Builder | NCSES | NSF .
- AFRI Obligations, data for the ten years that match the years from HERD. USASpending.gov - Federal Awards | Advanced Search | USAspending.
There are other "indicators" used as well beyond just research. It's not as straight-forward as the stats you provided. You would need to normalize the data between all the schools you listed to account for that. The AAU also seems to favor NIH (HHS) and NSF over other federal sources. On the NSF site, it links to each individual school, and you can see their "federally funded, by agency: 2021–12", though - while I'm not sure - I assume that includes the "formula-allocated USDA" research which does not count towards AAU.
https://www.tallahassee.com/story/news/2020/08/10/fsu-famu-break-research-records-earning-250-m-60-m-respectively/3332812001/
https://strategicplan.fsu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/2023-2027-Strategic-Plan.pdf
FSU strategic Plan
https://wvutoday.wvu.edu/stories/2018/12/19/wvu-maintains-r1-status-ranking-alongside-most-prestigious-research-universities
Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education
http://collegesportsinfo.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=9693
basically if your a Private (non religious) University in the USN&WR top 50 or Public USN&WR top 75 and are listed as a Carnegie Tier One Research University with a billion plus endowment then you’re a candidate for the AAU. Still the AAU is more likely to add public schools (since they tend to bring in more automatic research grants gifted to them by the state/fed) over private schools and from what little I know it’s also easier to monitor the progress (or lack there of) with a public school over the mostly self reporting done by private schools. This is why over the last few years you’ve seen a concerted effort to include at least one major public school from the most populous states and even adding a second like they did with TAMU and Stoney Brook back in 2001.
Generally the AAU is looking for candidates with strong STEM programs and if you have a Medical school it a huge bonus (only 16 of the 60 members do not have a medical school).
The schools below are the ones I’ve had in mind whenever anyone starts talking about the AAU adding members. No idea how they look on today’s scale but I thought they were legit candidates a while ago.
Public Candidates (in no order) UConn, UMass, or Clemson
Private Candidates (in no order) Miami or Northeastern (though with 4 private schools already in the Boston area I don’t think they’re going to add more anytime soon).
https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA552403010&sid=googleScholar&v=2.1&it=r&linkaccess=abs&issn=07413653&p=AONE&sw=w&userGroupName=anon%7E9cde3bad
https://www.tampabay.com/news/education/2021/09/27/usf-wants-to-join-an-elite-club-of-universities-50-million-could-help/
The last invitation, to Tufts university, was extended in May. Prior to that, three universities were invited in 2019 (American Universities today announced that Dartmouth College (@dartmouth); the University of California, Santa Cruz (@ucsc); and the University of Utah (@UUtah) have joined the association), one in 2012, one in 2010 and two in 2001.The University of Florida, invited in 1985, is the only Florida school in the group.
https://www.econjobrumors.com/topic/predicting-the-next-aau-members
This leaves 10 universities that are R1 private, but not AAU.
Baylor University
Boston College
Drexel University
George Washington University
Georgetown University
Northeastern University
Syracuse University
University of Denver
University of Miami
University of Notre Dame
While all of these universities would like to be in the AAU, only a few are viable. AAU considers research scholarship, university prestige, research funding, university ranking, etc. Also, one criteria is having a strong medical school.
Ones unlikely to be invited to AAU due to lack of strong research activities, funding, or ranking:
Baylor University (low prestige)
Drexel University (low prestige)
University of Denver (low prestige)
Syracuse University (removed from AAU)
Northeastern University (low prestige)
University of Notre Dame (no medical school)
I, therefore, come to the conclusion that the following four universities are likely to be invited to AAU in the next 10 years:
Boston College
Georgetown University
George Washington University
University of Miami
There are definitely quite a few undeserving, legacy AAU public universities, which I will list below (personal opinion), and it is largely my impression on their academic reputation and ranking:
University of Missouri (should be out)
University of Oregon (should be out)
University of Kansas (should be out)
Iowa State University (should be out)
Stony Brook (should be out)
I believe 2 universities that are not invited are way better than those listed above as "should be out" category, they are follows and are likely to get invites:
University of Georgia
NC State
Some honorable mentions here, unlikely but worth a look. Many of these have some fatal flows though, but who knows.
University of South Florida
University of Tennessee
University of Connecticut
Florida State University
Arizona State University
University of Illinois Chicago
Virginia Tech
UT Dallas
With above said, considering both public and private, ones most likely to be invited to AAU membership are follows, and by likelihood. I use reputation and NSF dollars as key indicators as those are what matter. Given there are only 64 AAU members in the US, I would only consider those are consistently highly ranked in the top. A school should be in the top for both funding and reputation to be even considered. I might digress here and say that given the lack of funding, BC will probably not be in AAU any time soon.
University US News NSF Dollars
1. University of Georgia 48 55
2. NC State 79 49
3. University of Miami 55 71
4. Georgetown University 23 101
5. University of Notre Dame 19 102
6. George Washington Un...See full post
iversity 63 91
7. Boston College 36 188
Below are benchmark data for those are in AAU and should likely be out:
University US News NSF Dollars
University of Missouri (definitely should be out) 122 89
University of Oregon (definitely should be out) 99 154
University of Kansas (definitely should be out) 122 75
Iowa State University (definitely should be out) 122 73
Stony Brook (borderline) 93 94
https://www.press-citizen.com/story/news/2022/05/04/iowa-state-one-only-5-universities-have-left-aau-since-1900-university-of-nebraska/7441834001/
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/05/02/out-club
https://csnbbs.com/thread-846618.html
There was a document that came out in FOI when Nebraska got kicked out. It ranked the schools based on the AAU's criteria. Syracuse who left on their own was apparently ranked #105. Nebraska was #109. The next two lowest (no names given) were #94 and #87.
There were 27 schools who are not now members of the AAU ranked 86 or higher. Now some of these are specialty schools or only medical schools and not eligible. Others like UAB and Cincinnati are high because of their attached highly regarded medical schools. But here are the schools and their rank:
1. Rockefeller University
2. UC-San Francisco
31. Yeshiva University
37. Dartmouth University
40. Alabama-Birmingham
43. Tufts University
49. Utah
52. UC-Santa Cruz
55. RPI
57. Wake Forest
59. Miami-FL
61. Illinois-Chicago
62. Cincinnati
64. Colorado St.
67. Oregon St.
68. George Washington University
72. Wayne St.
73. UC-Riverside
76. Alaska-Fairbanks
78. Virginia Commonwealth University
79. Vermont
79. Hawaii
81. Connecticut
83. Georgetown University
83. Delaware
86. SUNY-Albany
https://www.on3.com/boards/threads/any-knowledge-of-fsu-and-aau.966707/page-2
https://www.research.fsu.edu/publications-reports/annual-research-statistics/
Why isn’t FSU a member of the AAU?
