WSJ/College Pulse 2026 Best Colleges in America published today

[Anonymous]

My wife is in academia and I'm a hiring partner in finance/consulting and these rankings feel very random.

There are over a hundred great colleges not on folks' radars, so it's great that these various ranking publications try to mix things up beyond the usual suspects beyond Princeton, Stanford, Harvard, MIT, Yale. But this group seems like a list of odd bedfellows. I'm not sure what kid this kind of list serves?

I wouldn't put much credence in any ranking list to be honest, but this one in particular seems a bit silly and random.

[Anonymous]

Every methodology has biases. Look at US News. After they changed their algorithm a couple of years ago, there are now 6 UCs in the top 40, with UC Merced and its 95 percent acceptance rate and its 51 percent graduation rate after 6 years holding down the 57 spot.

Unfortunately, there are zero rankings presently that actually rate and measure the things most students and employers care about. So I wouldn't take any "official" ranking very seriously at present.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The WSJ rankings actually fill a very important niche for families that have little to no hope of attending even a top 50 school.

As an example, they list schools that we all know aren't "the best", but they represent likely great values and options for a lot of kids. Just looking at the list, below is an interesting sampling:

13. UC Davis
14. UC Merced
17. San Jose State University
19. Loyola University MD (I actually don't know if that's a great value)
21. Cal State Stanislaus
22. Cal State Pomona
28. Cal State San Obispo
32. Cal State Fresno
36. University of Detroit Mercy
38. University of Delaware
44. Baruch

It's not really saying these are the "best" colleges, but rather these colleges have the best relative outcomes for students.

I think including schools like Babson and Bentley is a bit unfair because they are 100% business...it's unclear how those schools would rank if only compared to Wharton, Stern, Ross et al.

End of the day, why do you go to college? To get a job. My problem with US News is it puts too much emphasis on graduation rate (like 25 percent). Most, if not all, high achieving students have no concern with graduating so this is not really something that should be weighted heavily. Also, it doesn’t consider academic rigor. For instance, Berkeley might be punished for being more rigorous than UCLA.

Yes, people needs jobs, but no, that's not what I value about college.

[Anonymous]

I looked at the methodology and the numbers. Man, full price payers are suckers! It says the average cost to attend #1 Stanford for all FOUR years is $12,136, and the value added to the graduate's salary is $94,725, hence 6 months to pay off. Avg net price for Princeton is $10,555.

"Years to pay off net price (17%): This measure combines two figures—the average net price of attending the college, and the value added to graduates’ median salary attributable to attending the college. The value added to graduates’ median salary by a college was estimated on the basis of the difference between the median earnings of the school’s graduates and the median earnings of high-school graduates in the state where the college is located and across the U.S. in proportion to the ratio of students who are in-state versus out-of-state. We then took the average annual net price of attending the college—including costs like tuition and fees, room and board, and books and supplies, taking into account any grants and scholarships, for students who received federal financial aid—and multiplied it by four to reflect an estimated cost of a four-year program. We then divided this overall net-price figure by the value added to a graduate’s salary, to provide an estimate of how quickly an education at the college pays for itself through the salary boost it provides. Our analysis for this metric used research on this topic by the policy-research think tank Third Way as a guide."

[Anonymous]

I know a lot of my colleagues look at UC Merced as a better school than half the Ivies, UChicago, Duke, etc.

This ranking by the WSJ is one of the better ones, maybe the new gold standard?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I looked at the methodology and the numbers. Man, full price payers are suckers! It says the average cost to attend #1 Stanford for all FOUR years is $12,136, and the value added to the graduate's salary is $94,725, hence 6 months to pay off. Avg net price for Princeton is $10,555.

"Years to pay off net price (17%): This measure combines two figures—the average net price of attending the college, and the value added to graduates’ median salary attributable to attending the college. The value added to graduates’ median salary by a college was estimated on the basis of the difference between the median earnings of the school’s graduates and the median earnings of high-school graduates in the state where the college is located and across the U.S. in proportion to the ratio of students who are in-state versus out-of-state. We then took the average annual net price of attending the college—including costs like tuition and fees, room and board, and books and supplies, taking into account any grants and scholarships, for students who received federal financial aid—and multiplied it by four to reflect an estimated cost of a four-year program. We then divided this overall net-price figure by the value added to a graduate’s salary, to provide an estimate of how quickly an education at the college pays for itself through the salary boost it provides. Our analysis for this metric used research on this topic by the policy-research think tank Third Way as a guide."

So, it's a nuanced distinction but an important one but it also makes the WSJ rankings difficult to understand. Here is how they look at salaries and how much weight they give to the rankings:

Salary impact (33%): This measures the extent to which a college boosts its graduates’ salaries beyond what they would be expected to earn regardless of which college they attended. We used statistical modeling to estimate what we would expect the median earnings of a college’s graduates to be on the basis of the exam results of its students prior to attending the college and the cost of living in the state in which the college is based. We then scored the college on its performance against that estimate. These scores were then combined with scores for raw graduate salaries to factor in absolute performance alongside performance relative to our estimates. Our analysis for this metric used research on this topic by the policy-research think tank the Brookings Institution as a guide.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I looked at the methodology and the numbers. Man, full price payers are suckers! It says the average cost to attend #1 Stanford for all FOUR years is $12,136, and the value added to the graduate's salary is $94,725, hence 6 months to pay off. Avg net price for Princeton is $10,555.

"Years to pay off net price (17%): This measure combines two figures—the average net price of attending the college, and the value added to graduates’ median salary attributable to attending the college. The value added to graduates’ median salary by a college was estimated on the basis of the difference between the median earnings of the school’s graduates and the median earnings of high-school graduates in the state where the college is located and across the U.S. in proportion to the ratio of students who are in-state versus out-of-state. We then took the average annual net price of attending the college—including costs like tuition and fees, room and board, and books and supplies, taking into account any grants and scholarships, for students who received federal financial aid—and multiplied it by four to reflect an estimated cost of a four-year program. We then divided this overall net-price figure by the value added to a graduate’s salary, to provide an estimate of how quickly an education at the college pays for itself through the salary boost it provides. Our analysis for this metric used research on this topic by the policy-research think tank Third Way as a guide."

What does that mean average price of Stanford is $12,136? 7 out of 8 kids are paying $0/yr and 1 kid is paying $100k/yr? Doesn't seem realistic to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Stanford, Babson, Yale are top-3. Rest is paywalled.

At a maximum acceptance rate of 17%, most applicants will not gain admission to these schools. For this reason, it may be immaterial how the WSJ arrived at its choices.

[Anonymous]

Finally, a ranking that puts my college above its rival. Woohoo!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Every methodology has biases. Look at US News. After they changed their algorithm a couple of years ago, there are now 6 UCs in the top 40, with UC Merced and its 95 percent acceptance rate and its 51 percent graduation rate after 6 years holding down the 57 spot.

Unfortunately, there are zero rankings presently that actually rate and measure the things most students and employers care about. So I wouldn't take any "official" ranking very seriously at present.

There is one ranking: the New York Times op-ed page on Sunday had an interesting chart with an essay that showed how selective colleges measure up against less selective colleges on student engagement based on a big survey done by Indiana University for decades. Check it out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The WSJ rankings actually fill a very important niche for families that have little to no hope of attending even a top 50 school.

As an example, they list schools that we all know aren't "the best", but they represent likely great values and options for a lot of kids. Just looking at the list, below is an interesting sampling:

13. UC Davis
14. UC Merced
17. San Jose State University
19. Loyola University MD (I actually don't know if that's a great value)
21. Cal State Stanislaus
22. Cal State Pomona
28. Cal State San Obispo
32. Cal State Fresno
36. University of Detroit Mercy
38. University of Delaware
44. Baruch

It's not really saying these are the "best" colleges, but rather these colleges have the best relative outcomes for students.

I think including schools like Babson and Bentley is a bit unfair because they are 100% business...it's unclear how those schools would rank if only compared to Wharton, Stern, Ross et al.

UC Davis is ranked 32 nationally and #9 for public institutions. Cal Poly and SJSU place more of their engineering students in SV .

[Anonymous]

Claremont McKenna is a great school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Claremont McKenna is a great school

Debatable. Very big on clout chasing over improving the school.

[Anonymous]

Lists that place a huge value on "ROI" are always going to highly rank pre-professional schools that skew towards lower-income students. In-state publics, tech schools like Bentley. Yes, if you come from a blue collar background and your peers become cashiers at WalMart, your Bentley degree that leads you to an accounting job at the local used car lot is a great investment. Does that make it a great choice for my child? No.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The WSJ rankings actually fill a very important niche for families that have little to no hope of attending even a top 50 school.

As an example, they list schools that we all know aren't "the best", but they represent likely great values and options for a lot of kids. Just looking at the list, below is an interesting sampling:

13. UC Davis
14. UC Merced
17. San Jose State University
19. Loyola University MD (I actually don't know if that's a great value)
21. Cal State Stanislaus
22. Cal State Pomona
28. Cal State San Obispo
32. Cal State Fresno
36. University of Detroit Mercy
38. University of Delaware
44. Baruch

It's not really saying these are the "best" colleges, but rather these colleges have the best relative outcomes for students.

I think including schools like Babson and Bentley is a bit unfair because they are 100% business...it's unclear how those schools would rank if only compared to Wharton, Stern, Ross et al.

I think LUMD gives out good merit aid.

Some of those Cal State numbers are skewed though because being in CA, the pay there is very high, but so is the col. It's too bad they can't adjust the income by col to get a more accurate picture.

Even so, Cal State schools do a great job of bringing up 1st gen and lower income students. I was one of them.

You might be correct...however, it's not like the SUNY schools are ranked super highly (best is Binghamton at 120) and some of those are in high COL areas. Baruch I guess is the best proxy, but that's the only NY public school in the top 100.

More than likely, it's because most at colleges like Pomona, SLO, SJSU go into CS/engineering, which is higher paying. I don't k now that much about SUNY schools and what the are known for, but I do know that those three CSU graduate a lot of CS/eng majors. While NYC certainly has a lot of tech, IMO, SV has more.