Apparently, a growing number of liberal arts colleges have decided to protest the US News rankings by declining to fill out the US news surveys.

The commitment, which some college presidents said was made by a large majority of participants, represents the most significant challenge yet to the rankings, adding colleges like Barnard, Sarah Lawrence and Kenyon to a growing rebellion against the magazine, participants said.

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“We really want to reclaim the high ground on this discussion,” said Katherine Will, the president of Gettysburg College and the incoming president of the Annapolis Group. “We should be defining the conversation, not a magazine that uses us for its business plan.” The association did not take a formal vote and each college will make its own decision, Dr. Will said.

With the exception of Kenyon (#32), I don’t think many of these schools will be hurt by this decision.

Barnard is essentially the homely younger sister of Columbia, and can and will always benefit from that association. (As somebody who was at Columbia for 2 years, I can say that with at least a bit of knowledge). Barnard’s median (i.e., 50th percentile) SAT is 1360 (670m/690v) for the class of 2010; by contrast, the 25th percentile student admitted to the age-normal undergraduate programs through the Columbia admissions office has a combined 1380 v+m SAT. SEAS (the engineering school, where I spent my 2 years in the 3-2 program) and Columbia College share an admissions office and an admissions program.

Barnard is essentially a backdoor to the Columbia experience for some women who don’t make the cut at Columbia but still want to go there. Between its association with Columbia, “Seven Sisters” name recognition, Manhattan location, cross-registration with Columbia, and high percentage of observant Jewish students, Barnard doesn’t need a particularly high ranking to draw students. Because of these factors, Barnard’s acceptance rate is much lower, due to much more interest in attending than a school not associated with Columbia would have.

Judith Shapiro is signing onto this because she can score points with other liberal arts college presidents without taking anything more than a marginal hit in the admissions process.

As for Sarah Lawrence (#45), it’s an Art school that I doubt seriously competes for students with interests elsewhere in the academy. Based on the students at my high school who went there, I didn’t know that Gettysburg (#45 as well) was even liberal arts — it’s the drunken fratboy Yang to Sarah Lawrence’s Yin. I doubt that schools that are ranked where they are in the US News Rankings have much to lose from their “protest”. What they hope to accomplish is to shame or cajole the rest of us — the top 25 liberal arts schools (or top 30, sans Barnie) — to drop out as well, and thereby pick up some of the higher-quality students who wouldn’t know just how good we are without a tip-top US news ranking.

Notably, even the AmHerst Marxist is not contributing his school’s ability to others’ needs.

Other college presidents who attended the meeting were more cautious. Anthony Marx, the president of Amherst, which is ranked second among liberal arts colleges, said he was not ready to stop cooperating with U.S. News and wanted to continue to discuss the issue.