This is a natural response to the incentive structure that has evolved. But fear not, the fact that this metric is being overemphasized to this large a degree s

This is a natural response to the incentive structure that has evolved. But fear not, the fact that this metric is being overemphasized to this large a degree surely must mean that the adversarial species (the industry) will respond by changing their strategy. The more universities focus on vanity metrics (helping students build their peacock tail), the more likely it is that the industry realizes the kink in their armour and shifts to some wiser signaling measure.