Dartmouth’s elite standing in higher education is secure. Founded in 1769, the Ivy League college in New Hampshire is esteemed worldwide for teaching and research. But this week it fell out of a college club many want to enter: A group of roughly 100 research-focused schools that insiders call “R1.” Among the 15 schools that climbed into the R1 group were West Virginia, Northeastern and George Mason universities. So what is R1 and why does it matter? This label — denoting schools with “highest research activity” — is part of a crucial sorting exercise that occurs once every five years, called the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education.

February 4, 2016 ・ From The Washington Post