The funny thing is Bob Hemmenway the former Chancellor of ku geared the whole school for moving up the US News Rankings, and instead every year they fell DOWN the US News Rankings.
I guess the interim Gubner is on the war path on this with the Regents . . . the thing is Gub, you're not going to get both K-State and ku farther up in the rankings if the state continues to treat higher education as an afterthought with only about 17 or 18% (if that) of Regents schools funding coming from the State itself. You're not going to get them higher up in the rankings with hundreds of millions of dollars in back logged maintenance. That being said, the US News rankings are really more of an opinion poll, where some schools literally lobby the people they believe will fill out surveys and try to convince them to give their school a higher rating.