College rankings keep growing more popular – and attracting more criticism.

There’s a lot of debate about what matters most, and whether organizations should rank colleges by what students are interested in, or hold institutions accountable for offering top-notch programs to their students.

Higher education experts gathered in Duques Hall on Thursday to debate existing university ranking systems and the ratings system under development by the U.S. Department of Education. The department released its framework for the system last month.

Here’s what you should know:

1. Rankings do matter

Ron Ehrenbert, director of the Cornell Higher Education Research Institute, said the popular U.S. News and World Report rankings focus on providing information to applicants, and that the rankings can affect how many application an institution might receive in the next year.

A study has shown that colleges or universities whose ranking improved tended to receive more applications, leading to a smaller acceptance rate and more prestige for the institution, he said. If their ranking fell, so did the number of applicants and the institution’s reputation.

“Administrators say they don’t pay attention to the rankings, they say they don’t read them, but that’s not true,” Ehrenbert said.

2. Pushing out the weak

Sandy Baum, a fellow in GW’s Graduate School of Education and Human Development, said it could be dangerous for the federal government to come out with their own ranking system, but that the department’s method of creating the ratings was strong.

“The one problem with the federal government coming out with a system is that it’s just another one in the whole set of ratings,” she said. “It becomes the rating system, and I don’t think there’s anything to do to change that.”

She questioned why some schools that haven’t produced successful graduates were still receiving federal funding, even though their students weren’t receiving a proper education.

“The reason, I think, this whole [thing] is happening is we haven’t figured out how to, politically, push those schools out,” she said. “And if we could do that, maybe we wouldn’t have to go through this complicated lens.”

3. A ranking for everyone

Both Ehrenbert and Baum said that the ranking systems that are now popular aren’t perfect and don’t have the right measurements for every possible applicant.

But if students look at the right ranking system, then they should be able to get the kind of feedback they’re looking for, Baum said.

“The fact is that you know what U.S. News is about is prestige and reputation and if what you want is a highly selective institution with a high reputation you’re right to look to them,” she said. “But if you’re saying that’s how you’re going to value institutions then you really have a problem.”