Top 10 public "ranking"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Department rankings shouldn’t be discarded either though. They are indicators of academic quality in different parts of the university and high rankings are often associated with more resources and better student outcomes for students within that department.

Especially for individuals looking into different schools to attend (rather than just wanting a broad ranking), going down to the department level makes a lot of sense.

But about half of students change their intended major before graduating. It makes most sense to look more carefully if you have to do direct admit to a program.

Or if you’re one of the half that knows what they want to do from the start…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Department rankings shouldn’t be discarded either though. They are indicators of academic quality in different parts of the university and high rankings are often associated with more resources and better student outcomes for students within that department.

Especially for individuals looking into different schools to attend (rather than just wanting a broad ranking), going down to the department level makes a lot of sense.

But about half of students change their intended major before graduating. It makes most sense to look more carefully if you have to do direct admit to a program.

Or if you’re one of the half that knows what they want to do from the start…

To add, even for the ones who might switch, it is important to look at departments to know whether you have something good to switch into.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Department rankings shouldn’t be discarded either though. They are indicators of academic quality in different parts of the university and high rankings are often associated with more resources and better student outcomes for students within that department.

Especially for individuals looking into different schools to attend (rather than just wanting a broad ranking), going down to the department level makes a lot of sense.

But about half of students change their intended major before graduating. It makes most sense to look more carefully if you have to do direct admit to a program.

Or if you’re one of the half that knows what they want to do from the start…

I think about half of those that know what they want to do end up majoring in something else. Up to 25% want to go to medical school. Far, far fewer ever end up going.

[Anonymous]

The top 10 public are:

Berkeley
UCLA
Michigan
UVA
Georgia Tech
North Carolina
Wisconsin
Texas
Florida
Illinois

[Anonymous]

I wish the anti UC poster whining about test blind would stop derailing the thread.

When looking at top public schools you should be looking at the strength of the field of study you are interested in pursing. The top 10 public institutions which yes includes Cal, UCLA, Davis, Irvine and San Diego are in the top 10 because they have achieved top status in multiple fields of study but this doesn’t mean that they have achieved top status in every field of study. When an institution invests and attracts top faculty it then is a magnet to attract more top faculty who are more competitive winning grants. Graduate students and top undergraduates want to be part of that research and gravitate there. Strength is built over decades and in STEM requires institutional investment. It truly does not matter what the SAT scores were for communication or sociology majors in another college and program.

You also need to be aware that several fields are more specialized particularly engineering. The upper division courses are important for landing a job or graduate admission. For example, don’t look at general engineering ranking, look at strength in your field..aero, EECS, civil/environmental, mechanical, chemical or biomechanical etc. The top schools shift around depending on program and some are much weaker in some fields. If you want to be an engineer in the automotive or aerospace industry then Purdue, Georgia Tech are better than Cal. If you want to work in Silicon Valley tech then Cal, and this will drive the VA poster crazy SJSU will place you better than any east coast school. Physics - Cal or UCSB (which isn’t in the top 10 overall). Civil, environmental or aero with agri focus, UCDavis. Biomedical go to UCSD. You want to work in the defense industry? UIUC, Georgia Tech. Etc etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Top public institutions are very large and serve a broad population. It is absolutely important to prioritize departmental rankings! The variety, depth and quality of upper division courses is tied directly to the faculty and TAs. Your experience if you are serious about your field of study will greatly be determined by this. We know two kids at Purdue both top students. One is majoring in a humanities degree and miserable, hates the area, experience, area is boring and classes to easy. The other wants to engineer automobiles. He is over the moon with joy. Spends his time with kids who are just as passionate about engineering and auto industry as he is, has an internship already and loves it. Despite being NMSF finds the engineering and math courses challenging.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The top 10 public are:

Berkeley
UCLA
Michigan
UVA
Georgia Tech
North Carolina
Wisconsin
Texas
Florida
Illinois

Best for WHAT?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Top public institutions are very large and serve a broad population. It is absolutely important to prioritize departmental rankings! The variety, depth and quality of upper division courses is tied directly to the faculty and TAs. Your experience if you are serious about your field of study will greatly be determined by this. We know two kids at Purdue both top students. One is majoring in a humanities degree and miserable, hates the area, experience, area is boring and classes to easy. The other wants to engineer automobiles. He is over the moon with joy. Spends his time with kids who are just as passionate about engineering and auto industry as he is, has an internship already and loves it. Despite being NMSF finds the engineering and math courses challenging.

Departmental rankings are usually for graduate programs. Graduate study is very different from the undergraduate experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Top public institutions are very large and serve a broad population. It is absolutely important to prioritize departmental rankings! The variety, depth and quality of upper division courses is tied directly to the faculty and TAs. Your experience if you are serious about your field of study will greatly be determined by this. We know two kids at Purdue both top students. One is majoring in a humanities degree and miserable, hates the area, experience, area is boring and classes to easy. The other wants to engineer automobiles. He is over the moon with joy. Spends his time with kids who are just as passionate about engineering and auto industry as he is, has an internship already and loves it. Despite being NMSF finds the engineering and math courses challenging.

Departmental rankings are usually for graduate programs. Graduate study is very different from the undergraduate experience.

You cannot separate these things so cleanly. The professors will be the same (and, yes, the professors will teach the undergrads and write the recommendation letters). The strong departments will have research money and offer research courses or seminars to top/interested students. The reputation of the department will help with jobs in that field—including if there is on-campus recruiting—and grad school applications. Any ECs tied to the department will be influenced by the quality and size of the department. You cannot separate these two things into entirely different worlds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Top public institutions are very large and serve a broad population. It is absolutely important to prioritize departmental rankings! The variety, depth and quality of upper division courses is tied directly to the faculty and TAs. Your experience if you are serious about your field of study will greatly be determined by this. We know two kids at Purdue both top students. One is majoring in a humanities degree and miserable, hates the area, experience, area is boring and classes to easy. The other wants to engineer automobiles. He is over the moon with joy. Spends his time with kids who are just as passionate about engineering and auto industry as he is, has an internship already and loves it. Despite being NMSF finds the engineering and math courses challenging.

Departmental rankings are usually for graduate programs. Graduate study is very different from the undergraduate experience.

You cannot separate these things so cleanly. The professors will be the same (and, yes, the professors will teach the undergrads and write the recommendation letters). The strong departments will have research money and offer research courses or seminars to top/interested students. The reputation of the department will help with jobs in that field—including if there is on-campus recruiting—and grad school applications. Any ECs tied to the department will be influenced by the quality and size of the department. You cannot separate these two things into entirely different worlds.

I don't agree. Professors can spend their time on research, graduates, or undergraduates. At research universities they usually prioritize those areas in that order, yet undergraduate tuition is used to subsidize research and graduate education. Being strong in research and graduate rankings does not mean the school is a great choice for an undergraduate. The other thing that happens is that tuition for majors in areas like humanities and social sciences will be used to subsidize STEM fields. Many undergraduates get the short stick at many universities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Top public institutions are very large and serve a broad population. It is absolutely important to prioritize departmental rankings! The variety, depth and quality of upper division courses is tied directly to the faculty and TAs. Your experience if you are serious about your field of study will greatly be determined by this. We know two kids at Purdue both top students. One is majoring in a humanities degree and miserable, hates the area, experience, area is boring and classes to easy. The other wants to engineer automobiles. He is over the moon with joy. Spends his time with kids who are just as passionate about engineering and auto industry as he is, has an internship already and loves it. Despite being NMSF finds the engineering and math courses challenging.

Departmental rankings are usually for graduate programs. Graduate study is very different from the undergraduate experience.

You cannot separate these things so cleanly. The professors will be the same (and, yes, the professors will teach the undergrads and write the recommendation letters). The strong departments will have research money and offer research courses or seminars to top/interested students. The reputation of the department will help with jobs in that field—including if there is on-campus recruiting—and grad school applications. Any ECs tied to the department will be influenced by the quality and size of the department. You cannot separate these two things into entirely different worlds.

I don't agree. Professors can spend their time on research, graduates, or undergraduates. At research universities they usually prioritize those areas in that order, yet undergraduate tuition is used to subsidize research and graduate education. Being strong in research and graduate rankings does not mean the school is a great choice for an undergraduate. The other thing that happens is that tuition for majors in areas like humanities and social sciences will be used to subsidize STEM fields. Many undergraduates get the short stick at many universities.

Sorry, but this is not how teaching assignments or university finances work. Most professors get undergrad teaching assignments and nearly all of your major’s courses will be taught by those professors. Do they all love those assignments? No, but they are still accessible to the students, and top students will generally find a receptive audience.

Undergraduate tuition does not subsidize grad programs. The funding comes from numerous other sources. Undergraduate tuition often doesn’t even cover the cost of the undergraduates. At large schools undergraduate tuition is often a very small portion of the school’s revenues.

This isn’t to say everything is great about being an undergrad. But if you aren’t looking into departments when you are looking at schools, I really don’t know what you’re doing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And now back to the OP question
Why are 5 UCs in the public top 10 rankings?
What about the other 5 in the top 10; how did they get there and why?

The argument for Berkeley, UCLA, and UCSD is pretty strong. I’d expand to Top 15 and have the following as my personal rankings:

Tier 1: Berkeley, UCLA, Michigan
Tier 2: UVA, UNC, Texas
Tier 3: Georgia Tech, Florida, Washington
Tier 4: UCSD, UIUC
Tier 5: Georgia, Purdue, Wisconsin, Florida St.

Let me fix this for you

Tier 1: Berkely, Georgia Tech, Michigan, Virginia, UNC
Tier 2 : UCLA Florida UIUC Texas
Tier 3: Purdue Wisconsin Washington UCSD

I think this is a really good ranking. My only revision would be to move Georgia Tech to Tier 2. The educational quality is definitely Tier 1, but it is mostly known for STEM/business. It lacks the well-rounded appeal of Berkeley, Michigan, UVA, and UNC. These schools have outstanding humanities majors that appeal to kids that want to go to law school, public policy, etc. GT does not appeal to most of these humanities focused kids.

With this same logic then - Virginia and UNC definitely should not be Tier 1 then because for their lack of outstanding or quality Engineering/Tech/Stem which one could argue is far more sought after by students in today's world than humanities. Let's just say these are all good schools in their own right.

With the same logic, perhaps only Berkeley, Michigan, and Texas are strong enough across STEM/Business/Social Sciences/Humanities to be Tier 1. But wait, students only attend one part of a university at a time and perhaps Virginia, UNC, Georgia Tech, Purdue, etc. is better in that part than Berkeley/Michigan/Texas and has more of what they value. What does this tiering even mean to those students? Pretty much nothing.

You’re hilarious. The UCLA hate is pathological up in here, that’s for sure.

UCLA is literally ranked higher in the U.S. and globally than Texas in almost every single area you mentioned, and yet you found a way to suggest otherwise.

STEM, whether bio / chem, engineering, applied math, engineering

Business (for UCLA, it’s just Business Economics - but also internship opportunities for the students who want to get after it at UCLA’s Top 15 business and law schools)

Social Sciences

Humanities

Tell us where you have found evidence that Texas is better than UCLA, such that you “accidentally” forgot to include what has been the Top Public for 80% of the past decade. Looking forward to it!

DP. Many people give the most weight to Engineering, Computer Science, and Business. A quick check of USNWR undergraduate rankings shows UT is ranked higher than UCLA in Engineering (6th vs 14th), Computer Science (9th vs 14th), and Business (6th vs NR / No business school).

Oh, OK - so based on the 2026 USNWR undergraduate rankings for those three areas, MIT is the unanimous best undergraduate university in the country and Tier 1 of public universities, in order, is Berkely, UIUC, Michigan.

I guess I can live with that.

2026 USNWR rankings for Undergraduate Engineering
1. MIT
2. Stanford
3. Georgia Institute of Technology (tie)
3. UC Berkely (tie)
5. Cal Tech
5. UIUC

2026 USNW rankings for Computer Science
1. MIT
2. Carnegie Mellon
2. Stanford
2. UC Berkely
5. Georgia Institute of Technology(tie)
5. Princeton
7. Cornell (tie)
7. UIUC

UIUC is probably underrated, but the way you listed this doesn't give proper credit to others like Michigan, GT, and Texas:

Computer Science
1 MIT
2 CMU / Stanford / Berkeley
5 GT / Princeton
7 Cornell / Illinois
9 Caltech / Texas / Washington
12 Michigan

Engineering
1 MIT
2 Stanford
3 GT / Berkeley
5 Caltech / Illinois / Michigan
8 CMU / Purdue
10 Cornell
11 Princeton / Texas

Business
1 MIT / Penn
3 Berkeley
4 Michigan
5 NYU
6 CMU / Texas

12 Illinois

19 GT

STEM isn’t just engineering and CS, check biology, chemistry, etc.

To the people that know..yes it is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

lol!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wish the anti UC poster whining about test blind would stop derailing the thread.

When looking at top public schools you should be looking at the strength of the field of study you are interested in pursing. The top 10 public institutions which yes includes Cal, UCLA, Davis, Irvine and San Diego are in the top 10 because they have achieved top status in multiple fields of study but this doesn’t mean that they have achieved top status in every field of study. When an institution invests and attracts top faculty it then is a magnet to attract more top faculty who are more competitive winning grants. Graduate students and top undergraduates want to be part of that research and gravitate there. Strength is built over decades and in STEM requires institutional investment. It truly does not matter what the SAT scores were for communication or sociology majors in another college and program.

You also need to be aware that several fields are more specialized particularly engineering. The upper division courses are important for landing a job or graduate admission. For example, don’t look at general engineering ranking, look at strength in your field..aero, EECS, civil/environmental, mechanical, chemical or biomechanical etc. The top schools shift around depending on program and some are much weaker in some fields. If you want to be an engineer in the automotive or aerospace industry then Purdue, Georgia Tech are better than Cal. If you want to work in Silicon Valley tech then Cal, and this will drive the VA poster crazy SJSU will place you better than any east coast school. Physics - Cal or UCSB (which isn’t in the top 10 overall). Civil, environmental or aero with agri focus, UCDavis. Biomedical go to UCSD. You want to work in the defense industry? UIUC, Georgia Tech. Etc etc.

Georgia Institute of Technology 2026 USNWR

#3 in Best Undergraduate Engineering Programs (tie)
#1 in Biomedical Engineering (tie)
#1 in Industrial / Manufacturing
#1 in Environmental / Environmental Health
#2 in Aerospace /Aeronautical / Astronautical
#2 in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
#2 in Civil Engineering
#3 in Electrical Engineering
#3 in Materials Engineering
#4 in Mechanical Engineering (tie)
#6 in Computer Engineering

#19 in Undergraduate Business Programs (tie)
#2 in Management Information Systems (tie)
#3 in Business Analytics
#5 in Quantitative Analysis
#6 in Production / Operation Management
#6 in Supply Chain Management / Logistics
[b]
#5 in Computer Science (tie)[/b
#1 in Mobile/Web Applications
#2 in Cybersecurity
#3 in Software Engineering (tie)
#5 in Artificial Intelligence
#5 in Data Analytics/Science
tie)

#3 in Co-ops/Internships
#3 in Most Innovative Schools
#21 in Best Undergraduate Teaching

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools should not be reduced to department rankings. That is a bad proxy for the overall experience and value.

Top public institutions are very large and serve a broad population. It is absolutely important to prioritize departmental rankings! The variety, depth and quality of upper division courses is tied directly to the faculty and TAs. Your experience if you are serious about your field of study will greatly be determined by this. We know two kids at Purdue both top students. One is majoring in a humanities degree and miserable, hates the area, experience, area is boring and classes to easy. The other wants to engineer automobiles. He is over the moon with joy. Spends his time with kids who are just as passionate about engineering and auto industry as he is, has an internship already and loves it. Despite being NMSF finds the engineering and math courses challenging.

Departmental rankings are usually for graduate programs. Graduate study is very different from the undergraduate experience.

You cannot separate these things so cleanly. The professors will be the same (and, yes, the professors will teach the undergrads and write the recommendation letters). The strong departments will have research money and offer research courses or seminars to top/interested students. The reputation of the department will help with jobs in that field—including if there is on-campus recruiting—and grad school applications. Any ECs tied to the department will be influenced by the quality and size of the department. You cannot separate these two things into entirely different worlds.

I don't agree. Professors can spend their time on research, graduates, or undergraduates. At research universities they usually prioritize those areas in that order, yet undergraduate tuition is used to subsidize research and graduate education. Being strong in research and graduate rankings does not mean the school is a great choice for an undergraduate. The other thing that happens is that tuition for majors in areas like humanities and social sciences will be used to subsidize STEM fields. Many undergraduates get the short stick at many universities.

Sorry, but this is not how teaching assignments or university finances work. Most professors get undergrad teaching assignments and nearly all of your major’s courses will be taught by those professors. Do they all love those assignments? No, but they are still accessible to the students, and top students will generally find a receptive audience.

Undergraduate tuition does not subsidize grad programs. The funding comes from numerous other sources. Undergraduate tuition often doesn’t even cover the cost of the undergraduates. At large schools undergraduate tuition is often a very small portion of the school’s revenues.

This isn’t to say everything is great about being an undergrad. But if you aren’t looking into departments when you are looking at schools, I really don’t know what you’re doing.

I know how university finances work and it is largely a cross-subsidization shell game as previously described.