“Baylor is at the top of the food chain when it comes to Texas universities. We are a top-notch institution academically.” [Tyler Cagle’s column “Waco not so Wacko: City offers more than people realize” published Sept. 30]
Really? What planet do you live on? There are at least a half-dozen Texas universities that are academically superior to Baylor University (not to be confused with Baylor Medical College, which has no connection to Baylor University). Baylor is not one of the three Texas universities who are members of AAU (look it up if you don’t know what AAU means). Baylor is not one of the 107 universities that Carnegie-Mellon designates as “Very High Research Activity” universities. The National Science Foundation ranks Baylor as 295th in money spent on academic research. While US News charitably ranks Baylor at 72, Forbes ranks Baylor 197.
While Baylor can defeat schools like Rice in football (70-17), there is no comparison academically. Baylor is not in the same league as Rice. Not even close. If you want to see what a superior tier one university looks like, I have done a side by side comparison of Baylor and Rice. Baylor is very mediocre.
W. Richard Turner, Ph.D., Hewitt, Texas
