Carnegie Research Classifications of Universities: Higher Ed is now the New Lake Wobegon

The theme of this blog is whether the public can trust higher ed when we spin faster than the Tasmanian Devil in Looney Tunes cartoons. This might help you decide whether you want to take the arduous journey of reading this post. Concise is not my middle name.

Listening to Prairie Home Companion was a Saturday night ritual when I was in graduate school. It was my companion. I was almost always alone in the lab or at home on Saturday nights before I adopted an autistic boy's best companion- a dog. I had hoped that one day that I could tell stories like Garrison Keillor that were warm, funny and profound all at the same time. That is still on my bucket list. I can't seem to get to it- lots of distractions these days.

My wife has family in Minnesota. Garrison Keillor actually babysat my wife's cousin. So, rest assured that although Lake Wobegon is a fictional town, it actually exists. Go figure.

The new Carnegie Classifications reminded me of Garrison Keillor's invention of Lake Wobegon, "where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking and all the children are above average." Originally, these classifications were meant to help researchers that study higher education by grouping similar institutions into categories. They have served various purposes since then-- now mostly as talking points. And, in time, every university with PhD programs will likely be classified as R1. The town of Higher Ed will surpass Lake Wobegon. Soon, all our children won't just be above average, they will all be in the top 5%.

If you ask Google whether an R1 institution is better than an R2 institution, then you might get this answer generated by AI, "Yes, R1 universities are generally considered to be better than R2 universities because they have higher research activity and receive more funding." Not surprisingly, then, a large number of universities want to be R1.

The myth that simply being classified as R1=better is near the top of my list of stupid things in academe that can cause stress for a chief research officer. For example, in 2010, Carnegie came out with a new algorithm for research classifications. This was based on a complicated weighted model of total research expenditures and per capita faculty research expenditures in addition to the number of PhD graduates. To be more inclusive, they also tried to add data from NSF's survey on humanities research expenditures, even though the data in that survey had no standards and was ridiculous. When the adjusted rankings came out, Rice University would have been moved out of R1 into R2 and the University of Houston would move into R1 and out of R2. I was the VPR at Rice at the time. Had you been there with me in the administration building you might have thought an asteroid was about to pummel the campus, destroy its reputation, and change Rice vs U. Houston's role in Houston forever. I got the job of absorbing most of the impact.

The algorithm developed for 2010 was complicated and based on a principal component analysis (the 2025 classifications is simple). We managed to get one of the Rice stats professors to recreate the statistical model and discovered, well... that it sucked.

After maybe 80 hours of work being a shock absorber and assigned to lead solving the problem, a letter way longer than this blog, was sent to Carnegie explaining all of the flaws in their data and their model. Other institutions that fell out of R1 also did. And, Carnegie decided not to remove any institutions from R1 based on the flawed formula, but institutions that were new to R1 based on the flawed algorithm were able to keep their new classification.

Fast forward. I was excited to come to UNCG as provost because the chancellor's vision was not to be R1 but to be a great R2. That meant something specific to me. It meant an institution that embraced its transformational mission for undergraduate students, but also would develop a select number of doctoral programs that could be nationally competitive.

UNCG's new strategic plan came out in 2024 with a goal of reaching R1 status. I could only shake my head.

I digress. Back to why I think the new Carnegie Classifications turn higher ed into Lake Wobegon.

The new 2025 classifications set an arbitrary floor of $50million in annual expenditures. In the 1994 Carnegie Classification, the minimal research expenditures were $40million in federal research grants, or over $86million in today's dollars. Research expenditures now include other external research support and institutional research expenditures in addition to federal support, which would make maybe $120million more comparable to 1994. Do you think maybe there has been grade inflation? Also, 41 institutions moved into the R1 category in 2025 who weren't R1 in 2020. So, in only five years, there was a 28% increase in "top tier" research institutions. Really?

Furthermore, Carnegie classified a total of 326 institutions with at least 20 research doctorates, 187 of them are now classified as R1 (57.4%), the others as R2. Another 216 institutions were classified in the only other research classification, R3, having met a bar of $2.5 million in research expenditures (no indication of doctoral students). R1 represents 35% of every school classified for research.

A chancellor from a new R1 entry boasted of being in the top 5% of all US colleges and universities. That is probably true and was true before the R1 designation. But, most of those, like community colleges, don't have a research mission. Personally, I might lean to an apples to apples comparison.

In 2023, there were 33 institutions with over $1billion in research expenditures and a total of 63 with at least $500million in research expenditures. The difference between institutions below $100million vs the 63 institutions over $500,000,000 is greater than the difference between them and the 216 schools in R3.

And, in the end, nothing changed for the 41 new R1 institutions other than an outside organization lowered the floor of their classification.

But this is big news!

Here are a few statements from a sample of the 41 schools that are new to an R1 classification.

"R1 is more than a classification for xxx: It’s a game changer."

"This prestigious designation is not something for which we can apply, or that we can independently self-identify. It is one of the most preeminent acknowledgements recognizing the tireless work of our faculty and researchers and our students." (an aside: As a faculty member, I worked tirelessly for students. Also as a researcher, I loved my research, and hoped to make an impact on my discipline, never to help the institution receive recognition. I started my career at an AAU institution (the most prestigious group) and never cared/knew about that designation until I became an administrator and read too many strategic plans aimed at getting in AAU or R1 even though the metrics for both of those were not clear.

"The recognition reflects xxx's broad impact and evolution into a world-class hub for research, innovation, entrepreneurship, and public scholarship."

"This is an important milestone for xxx that recognizes our leadership role in conducting innovative academic research and educating students at the highest level"

"Carnegie R1 designation is synonymous with academic excellence, research innovation and impact, the catalysts for research breakthroughs that lead to new technologies, businesses and economic growth".

Can we please stop spinning? R1 simply recognizes now that the institution spends more than $50million dollars on research and annually has 70 research doctorates. There is still is an enormous differences in research capacity between the 41 new R1 schools compared to the 63 schools with over $500million in research in competitiveness and economic impact.

I read so much from higher ed thought leaders regarding how the public has lost trust in universities and that we have to rebuild that trust. How can we rebuild that trust when we obfuscate the truth every time we can spin something? It doesn't take a genius to know that the University of Toledo is not really in the same tier in research and graduate programs as Ohio State. The University of North Carolina-Charlotte is not in the same tier as UNC Chapel Hill or Duke. San Diego State is not the same as UC- San Diego. Of course this doesn't mean that they are all not great places. I think they are. But, really, isn't it OK to just be great at who you are?

If you read this far, then I applaud you for your patience. And I will assume you are interested in my opinion. I think It is simply time to end Carnegie Classifications for research. Their original goal made sense- to try and classify universities that are similar for research on higher education. Can we go back to that? Suggesting that institutions with more than several hundred million dollars or over $1billion of research are "the same" as those with $50million does not.

And, on a final note, there have been comments indicating that being R1 gives greater access to research funds. I haven't seen data, but I doubt that is true. First, with respect to research funds, agencies are funding projects developed by faculty, not by institutional administration. I have never seen a discussion where a proposal was reviewed more poorly because a PI was not employed by an R1. In some programs at NSF, like innovative graduate program support, it is an advantage with respect to success rates to be an R2 because they will have separate review panels for R1 vs. R2.

I do not know of single thing where being in a grouping with 187 institutions called R1 has any advantage other than spin to alumni, politicians, and boards. Sometime faculty being recruited care about the designation, but they care because they think it relates to the research environment, research infrastructure and teaching expectation and don't fully understand categories now are just an arbitrary amount of research funding and research doctorates.

The outcome of research is what matters. That should be the focus of what we talk about without spin. There is GREAT material there! We should just stop with celebrating meaningless designations and celebrate what really matters.