Proud Cyclones have been lighting up social media this week with links to Daniel Luzer’s commentary for the Washington Monthly blog about Iowa State University as a contender for the “best college in America” title. Luzer’s post is three months old, but it flew under my radar (and that of many other Iowans) at that time. To support his point, he cited Rebecca Schuman’s piece for Slate on February 10 of this year. She observed:

Additionally, let me offer a hearty congratulations goes to the proud trend-resisters at Iowa State University, who have increased faculty hiring while others have slashed it, and decreased administration while others have bloated it. […]

After all, it turns out that focusing on academics helps student retention more than climbing walls, anyway. That’s the good news out of Iowa State University, which, according to the report by the Delta Costs Project at the American Institutes for Research, is the only-only-institution of higher learning in the entire country to spend the last eight years hiring full-time faculty and shrinking its administration. ISU President Steven Leath explained to the Des Moines Register that ISU wanted to “run a very lean operation and put as much into direct support of students and faculty” as possible, boosting full-time faculty hiring by an astounding 41 percent. (No riot-inducing tuition hike yet, Rex Ramsier!)

Indeed, Iowa State is being lauded as one of the most efficiently run universities in the nation-and its student retention is up 3 percent since 2005. This might not be a spectacular number, but it’s a better increase than its rival, the University of Iowa, a prestigious flagship Research I institution (that, according to the Delta Costs Project, has added much fewer full-time faculty members and many more staff positions).

Praising Iowa State for its “very real focus on hiring tenure-track faculty and keeping students enrolled from year to year,” Luzer pointed to a 2011 report in Washington Monthly about the trend toward administrative growth at U.S. colleges and universities.

The Bleeding Heartland community includes many Iowa State alumni and more than a few faculty at ISU and other Iowa colleges and universities. I’m interested in hearing your perspective on the points Schuman and Luzer raised.