What are the top 10 universities in the USA?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a bit of a nebulous concept but I think most would say that these kinds of lists are trying to capture some mixture of prestige, student caliber, desirability, teaching quality, and research productivity. While I think PP's list is a good one, I think it leans a bit heavy toward the graduate schools and research output.

My list is pretty much identical to this earlier list upthread:

1. Harvard
2. Yale
3. Stanford
4. Columbia
5. Princeton
6. U. Pennsylvania
7. U. Chicago
8. Northwestern
9. Duke
10. Johns Hopkins

I'm not quite sure UC Berkeley would be considered a top 10 university. For many PhD programs, absolutely. But not many would consider it within the context of these other super-schools.

Caltech, too, strikes me as a bit too small to be included here, although I would also consider it world-class. Along with Juilliard, those two schools sort of occupy polar ends of a spectrum of higher education, and are arguably the world's best in each of their respective domains.

I disagree that UCB should not be included in the top ten. After HYPSM, there are about 15 schools that could be considered top ten. So many posters are stuck on USNWR undergraduate ratings they forget that universities have multiple purposes, and that includes graduate programs. When a poster asks about the top ten universities in the USA, it shouldn’t automatically exclude the reputation of the entire school.

I don't disagree with you there! While UCB is a powerhouse in academia (one of the best), however, schools like Northwestern & Duke, for example, have stronger law schools, med schools, and in the case of NW, a stronger business school as well. They also have much stronger undergraduate offerings.

As an aside, would throw MIT into that list up top as well.

Duke and Northwestern do not have stronger law schools than Berkeley, Berkeley law is considered stronger. Duke has a worse business school and Northwestern is about the same.

Berkeley doesn't have a medical school so comparing medical schools makes no sense. If you want to count UCSF as Berkeley's medical school, it blows Duke and Northwestern's medical school out of the water.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a bit of a nebulous concept but I think most would say that these kinds of lists are trying to capture some mixture of prestige, student caliber, desirability, teaching quality, and research productivity. While I think PP's list is a good one, I think it leans a bit heavy toward the graduate schools and research output.

My list is pretty much identical to this earlier list upthread:

1. Harvard
2. Yale
3. Stanford
4. Columbia
5. Princeton
6. U. Pennsylvania
7. U. Chicago
8. Northwestern
9. Duke
10. Johns Hopkins

I'm not quite sure UC Berkeley would be considered a top 10 university. For many PhD programs, absolutely. But not many would consider it within the context of these other super-schools.

Caltech, too, strikes me as a bit too small to be included here, although I would also consider it world-class. Along with Juilliard, those two schools sort of occupy polar ends of a spectrum of higher education, and are arguably the world's best in each of their respective domains.

I disagree that UCB should not be included in the top ten. After HYPSM, there are about 15 schools that could be considered top ten. So many posters are stuck on USNWR undergraduate ratings they forget that universities have multiple purposes, and that includes graduate programs. When a poster asks about the top ten universities in the USA, it shouldn’t automatically exclude the reputation of the entire school.

I don't disagree with you there! While UCB is a powerhouse in academia (one of the best), however, schools like Northwestern & Duke, for example, have stronger law schools, med schools, and in the case of NW, a stronger business school as well. They also have much stronger undergraduate offerings.

As an aside, would throw MIT into that list up top as well.

Duke and Northwestern do not have stronger law schools than Berkeley, Berkeley law is considered stronger. Duke has a worse business school and Northwestern is about the same.

Berkeley doesn't have a medical school so comparing medical schools makes no sense. If you want to count UCSF as Berkeley's medical school, it blows Duke and Northwestern's medical school out of the water.

I also wouldn't consider Berkeley's undergraduate "offerings" to be stronger than Duke/Northwestern at all, if anything Berkeley is more rigorous.

[Anonymous]

Per the QS rankings, the top US schools are:

MIT
Harvard
Stanford
Caltech
Chicago
Penn
Yale
Cornell
Columbia
Michigan

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Per the QS rankings, the top US schools are:

MIT
Harvard
Stanford
Caltech
Chicago
Penn
Yale
Cornell
Columbia
Michigan

The next ten are:
Northwestern
Berkeley
NYU
UCLA
Duke
Carnegie Mellon
UC San Diego
Brown
Wisconsin
Texas

[Anonymous]

Per the Center for World University Rankings (CWUR), the top US schools are:

Harvard
MIT
Stanford
Princeton
Columbia
UChicago
Penn
Yale
Caltech
UC Berkeley

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Per the Center for World University Rankings (CWUR), the top US schools are:

Harvard
MIT
Stanford
Princeton
Columbia
UChicago
Penn
Yale
Caltech
UC Berkeley

til, there is an international originization dedication to the same idiocy as this thread

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I haven't paid much attention to this thread (my undergrad and post-undergrad schools are in the top 10 in any conceivable ranking), but must say it's kind of heart-warming to know that there's a home on DCUM for the insecure nerds to keep touting their own schools (especially Cal Tech, MIT, Columbia, Chicago, and Johns Hopkins) to previously unscaled heights. Mazel tov.

Wow. Could this be any snottier?

[Anonymous]

Per the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), the top US schools are:

Harvard
Stanford
MIT
UC Berkeley
Princeton
Columbia
Caltech
UChicago
Yale
Cornell

[Anonymous]

Per the US News Best Global Universities Ranking, the top US schools are:

Harvard
MIT
Stanford
UC Berkeley
Columbia
Caltech
University of Washington
JHU
Princeton
Yale

[Anonymous]

Per the Round University Rankings, the top US schools are:

Harvard
Caltech
Stanford
MIT
Columbia
Yale
Penn
JHU
Northwestern
Princeton

[Anonymous]

And yet the only ranking that people actually care about are USNWR national rankings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a bit of a nebulous concept but I think most would say that these kinds of lists are trying to capture some mixture of prestige, student caliber, desirability, teaching quality, and research productivity. While I think PP's list is a good one, I think it leans a bit heavy toward the graduate schools and research output.

My list is pretty much identical to this earlier list upthread:

1. Harvard
2. Yale
3. Stanford
4. Columbia
5. Princeton
6. U. Pennsylvania
7. U. Chicago
8. Northwestern
9. Duke
10. Johns Hopkins

I'm not quite sure UC Berkeley would be considered a top 10 university. For many PhD programs, absolutely. But not many would consider it within the context of these other super-schools.

Caltech, too, strikes me as a bit too small to be included here, although I would also consider it world-class. Along with Juilliard, those two schools sort of occupy polar ends of a spectrum of higher education, and are arguably the world's best in each of their respective domains.

I disagree that UCB should not be included in the top ten. After HYPSM, there are about 15 schools that could be considered top ten. So many posters are stuck on USNWR undergraduate ratings they forget that universities have multiple purposes, and that includes graduate programs. When a poster asks about the top ten universities in the USA, it shouldn’t automatically exclude the reputation of the entire school.

I don't disagree with you there! While UCB is a powerhouse in academia (one of the best), however, schools like Northwestern & Duke, for example, have stronger law schools, med schools, and in the case of NW, a stronger business school as well. They also have much stronger undergraduate offerings.

As an aside, would throw MIT into that list up top as well.

Duke and Northwestern do not have stronger law schools than Berkeley, Berkeley law is considered stronger. Duke has a worse business school and Northwestern is about the same.

Berkeley doesn't have a medical school so comparing medical schools makes no sense. If you want to count UCSF as Berkeley's medical school, it blows Duke and Northwestern's medical school out of the water.

Duke is #3 medical school in USNWR, UCSF is #4, so not sure how that is blowing it out of the water. Not only that, is obviously isn't part of Berkeley. But perhaps if we consider MIT to be Harvard's engineering school. . .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's a bit of a nebulous concept but I think most would say that these kinds of lists are trying to capture some mixture of prestige, student caliber, desirability, teaching quality, and research productivity. While I think PP's list is a good one, I think it leans a bit heavy toward the graduate schools and research output.

My list is pretty much identical to this earlier list upthread:

1. Harvard
2. Yale
3. Stanford
4. Columbia
5. Princeton
6. U. Pennsylvania
7. U. Chicago
8. Northwestern
9. Duke
10. Johns Hopkins

I'm not quite sure UC Berkeley would be considered a top 10 university. For many PhD programs, absolutely. But not many would consider it within the context of these other super-schools.

Caltech, too, strikes me as a bit too small to be included here, although I would also consider it world-class. Along with Juilliard, those two schools sort of occupy polar ends of a spectrum of higher education, and are arguably the world's best in each of their respective domains.

I disagree that UCB should not be included in the top ten. After HYPSM, there are about 15 schools that could be considered top ten. So many posters are stuck on USNWR undergraduate ratings they forget that universities have multiple purposes, and that includes graduate programs. When a poster asks about the top ten universities in the USA, it shouldn’t automatically exclude the reputation of the entire school.

I don't disagree with you there! While UCB is a powerhouse in academia (one of the best), however, schools like Northwestern & Duke, for example, have stronger law schools, med schools, and in the case of NW, a stronger business school as well. They also have much stronger undergraduate offerings.

As an aside, would throw MIT into that list up top as well.

Duke and Northwestern do not have stronger law schools than Berkeley, Berkeley law is considered stronger. Duke has a worse business school and Northwestern is about the same.

Berkeley doesn't have a medical school so comparing medical schools makes no sense. If you want to count UCSF as Berkeley's medical school, it blows Duke and Northwestern's medical school out of the water.

Duke is #3 medical school in USNWR, UCSF is #4, so not sure how that is blowing it out of the water. Not only that, is obviously isn't part of Berkeley. But perhaps if we consider MIT to be Harvard's engineering school. . .

That's solely in research, now compare the other rankings like primary care.

MIT and Harvard are two completely separate institutions. UC Berkeley and UCSF are two campuses within the same university system.

But I'm not the one claiming that Northwestern and Duke's medical schools are better than Berkeley's non-existent medical school.

[Anonymous]

Maybe it’s due to where I am in the country but I don’t know many people (if at all) who would prefer Berkeley over Duke or Northwestern.

[Anonymous]

^except for CS