It is interesting to study the top three winners and losers in fractional change in perceived quality as a function of the composition of their faculties in the decade before the NRC study, during the NRC study (nominally 1987-92), and in the years following. We tabulate below the fractional NRC relative change in quality of these six departments to compare with the changes underway in their physics program. In each of the time periods the physics faculty composition is given by total faculty, Superatomic faculty, and Subatomic faculty in that order. The remainder constitutes Astronomy faculty in a joint department.

UNIVERSITY	DELTA(Q)/Q	1978/79	1990/91/92	1995/96/97
UT Arlington	0.3649	16,11,5	18,13,4	17,10,7
Old Dominion	0.3118	12,12,0	12,9,2	21,8,13
Alabama	0.2644	17,12,3	22,9,7	21,7,8
Missouri Rolla	-0.1350	27,26,1	22,22,0	19,19,0
Temple	-0.1523	28,15,11	21,11,8	20,13,7
Rockefeller	-0.1850	16,0,16	17,0,17	12,0,12

The actual cause of the significant changes in perceived quality of these six Universities is, of course, subject to interpretation.

Significant declines in superatomic faculty are apparent in each of the six faculties except for Rockefeller which has traditionally not participated in condensed matter physics.

In the cases of the three most rapidly improving departments in relative perceived quality there has been a significant growth in subatomic faculty although in the case of UT Arlington this growth did not actually take place until after the period of the NRC ranking. One can debate whether the respondents in the NRC survey, knowing of the progressive leadership on that campus, anticipated the major changes about to take place in that department. UT Arlington was to be the nearest university to the Superconducting Supercollider and Old Dominion University is the nearest university to the newly commissioned Jefferson Laboratory. The University of Alabama was also known to be seriously considering the establishment of an Institute for High Energy Physics to be named after her illustrious alumnus Robert J. Van de Graaff.

In the case of the departments most rapidly declining in relative perceived quality, one can note a precipitous loss of faculty, although again in the case of Rockefeller University the actual drop in faculty size did not take place until after the nominal period of the NRC rankings. It is also possible that Rockefeller was penalized for having a faculty too unbalanced toward subatomic physics. Rockefeller is the only highly ranked University with no participation in superatomic physics although there are many low ranked departments with no participation in subatomic physics.