2024 US News rankings

[Anonymous]

Because so many colleges are TO, test scores are a flawed measure of peer quality. Getting rid of a second measure (also flawed to be sure) dilutes one measure of quality. Then they get rid of class size, which matters, faculty with PhDs, and the amount of spending per student. What that means is that schools that rely on adjuncts and TAs and big lecture-hall classes will rise in the rankings, and those that invest in small classes and quality instruction get short shrift. But hey, cram more Pell grant students into those lecture halls and all will be well. Oy. Maybe this will break everyone’s addiction to these ridiculous rankings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's baffling that Michigan and UNC are ranked so high compared to UVA. In Virginia, Michigan is regarded as a safety school and UVA is much better. UVA has a much lower acceptance rate and the SAT scores are much higher, this ranking is a joke.

I thought the same. UNC is also a much easier admit in state and that’s where it takes the majority of its students.

UNC is much easier to get into from in-state than UVA is in-state. About 15-20% of my kid's NC high school got into or go to UNC. I don't think the same is true regarding my previous Fairfax County high school with regards to UVA. I'm not a UVA booster - my kids didn't apply or don't go to either school. I am just always surprised by all the kids who get into UNC from our school. Many are my kids' friends and while they are mostly good students, several are not top students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Princeton puts its endowment to work. I mean, I think they should make tuition 20k and get out of the college financing industry full stop, but at least they try more than most. And the word has gotten out that they're the most generous. So I get why they remain on top.

Princeton's endowment is going on $5M per student. The payout from that at 5% is $250K per student per year. It could be free in perpetuity with more than enough to cover the cost of attendance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The irony here is that the public schools produce more social mobility only for in state students who are already applying in droves. Most charge private school tuition at full freight to out of staters.

UCLA and Cal charge roughly $20K less per year than most of the top 25 privates. My DD is at UCLA and her tuition is lower than the DC private school that she graduated from!

My kid graduated from Berkeley recently and it was less expensive than all of the privates being considered due to scholarship money.[/quote]


Well, goody for both of you. Today, both UCLA and Berkeley take less than 10% OOS because the citizens of California revolted about inability to get into their great schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People only went to Washu because it was T15. Apps are going to crater this year and next.

Nice try

If you don’t think that dropping to 24 is going to cause a lot of potential applicants to look elsewhere you’re crazy.

Columbia dropped from 2 to 18 after they were caught falsifying data given to US News, and they were fine. I think WashU will be fine too.

No, Columbia isn't even in the rankings anymore as a result of this

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are you talking about?

24 < 25

Did you take any math classes in your life?

Anonymous wrote:It is noticeable that all the top publics went up in rankings except for one. Only UVA went down and out of top 25. Wonder why?

No. It’s at 24.

I thought UVA was at 26?

It is at 26. Went from 25 to 26.

No, UVA went from 25 to 24. Go look

[Anonymous]

As a Clemson fan, seeing Duke at 7 stings a bit. They need to pick between academics and athletics, no school can have it all!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:USC no longer top 25…again. Just as I figured.

Good. It should have never gone that high. Ask anyone (intelligent) who lives in so California. They are bewildered by its popularity

Yup, this. +1,000,000 (and for the record, I still think that Cal and UCLA are underrated)

yes. Cal should be top 10 at least like it used to be before the rankings were taken over by money and greed not academics and research.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What are you talking about?

24 < 25

Did you take any math classes in your life?

Anonymous wrote:It is noticeable that all the top publics went up in rankings except for one. Only UVA went down and out of top 25. Wonder why?

No. It’s at 24.

I thought UVA was at 26?

It is at 26. Went from 25 to 26.

No, UVA went from 25 to 24. Go look

It wet down couple spots below UNC on the Best Public Universities list and stayed about the same on the National list so overall UVA went down while all other top publics went up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's baffling that Michigan and UNC are ranked so high compared to UVA. In Virginia, Michigan is regarded as a safety school and UVA is much better. UVA has a much lower acceptance rate and the SAT scores are much higher, this ranking is a joke.

In Virginia (VA resident for 26 years), Michigan is regarded as a better school in general than UVA and UVA has a higher acceptance rate than Michigan. UVA should be ranked around 30.

I'm a college counselor. This is false. Usually, instate Virginians go to Michigan as OOS public if they can't get into the Virginia school of their choice. UVA has a lower acceptance rate at 16.3 percent compared to Michigan at 22.9 percent. UVA has been ranked at 25 for a long time (now 24) and a top public Ivy for decades. The only reason it dropped on the public list from no. 3 to 5 is due to the Pell Grant factor which USNWR seems hung up on, but the Virginia colleges can control because Pell Grants are assessed after admissions. So long as that factor remains, UVA and other economically stronger states will be lower on the public school lists. Michigan also takes in 50% OOS because it needs to drive up its stats. UVA doesn't need to do that. And, finally, Michigan's stats are not as good as UVAs. Michigan's SAT 50% is 1350-1530 and ACT is at 31-34. UVA is higher in both categories at 1390-1570 and 32-35.

And as to costs, the reasons that Virginians prefer in-state VA is because OOS Michigan is $76,295 a year and UVA is $36,316.

Now do UM in state versus OOS acceptance as compared to UVa in state versus OOS acceptance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's baffling that Michigan and UNC are ranked so high compared to UVA. In Virginia, Michigan is regarded as a safety school and UVA is much better. UVA has a much lower acceptance rate and the SAT scores are much higher, this ranking is a joke.

In Virginia (VA resident for 26 years), Michigan is regarded as a better school in general than UVA and UVA has a higher acceptance rate than Michigan. UVA should be ranked around 30.

I'm a college counselor. This is false. Usually, instate Virginians go to Michigan as OOS public if they can't get into the Virginia school of their choice. UVA has a lower acceptance rate at 16.3 percent compared to Michigan at 22.9 percent. UVA has been ranked at 25 for a long time (now 24) and a top public Ivy for decades. The only reason it dropped on the public list from no. 3 to 5 is due to the Pell Grant factor which USNWR seems hung up on, but the Virginia colleges can control because Pell Grants are assessed after admissions. So long as that factor remains, UVA and other economically stronger states will be lower on the public school lists. Michigan also takes in 50% OOS because it needs to drive up its stats. UVA doesn't need to do that. And, finally, Michigan's stats are not as good as UVAs. Michigan's SAT 50% is 1350-1530 and ACT is at 31-34. UVA is higher in both categories at 1390-1570 and 32-35.

And as to costs, the reasons that Virginians prefer in-state VA is because OOS Michigan is $76,295 a year and UVA is $36,316.

Yep. And I'm a Hokie. Frankly, I'd have my kids attend Tech over UMich as well. Huge cost savings for essentially the same level of education.

"essentially" is doing a lot of work there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The irony here is that the public schools produce more social mobility only for in state students who are already applying in droves. Most charge private school tuition at full freight to out of staters.

UCLA and Cal charge roughly $20K less per year than most of the top 25 privates. My DD is at UCLA and her tuition is lower than the DC private school that she graduated from!

But you also have to pay for room and board. UCLA itself lists total cost of attendance at $71,000 for out of state.

Yes, but you also have to pay room and board at the privates! I'm just talking straight tuition. LA room and board probably ranges from around $15-20K. I don't know what the dorms are now cuz DD lives off-campus, so we pay total around $65K. Add room and board to the privtes and what do you pay? My niece is at Brown and I believe it's north of $85K. They're full pay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The irony here is that the public schools produce more social mobility only for in state students who are already applying in droves. Most charge private school tuition at full freight to out of staters.

UCLA and Cal charge roughly $20K less per year than most of the top 25 privates. My DD is at UCLA and her tuition is lower than the DC private school that she graduated from!

But you also have to pay for room and board. UCLA itself lists total cost of attendance at $71,000 for out of state.

Yes, but you also have to pay room and board at the privates! I'm just talking straight tuition. LA room and board probably ranges from around $15-20K. I don't know what the dorms are now cuz DD lives off-campus, so we pay total around $65K. Add room and board to the privtes and what do you pay? My niece is at Brown and I believe it's north of $85K. They're full pay.

$71,000 is out of reach for all but the most well off just as 85,000 is. Goodness, this isn’t difficult lady.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because so many colleges are TO, test scores are a flawed measure of peer quality. Getting rid of a second measure (also flawed to be sure) dilutes one measure of quality. Then they get rid of class size, which matters, faculty with PhDs, and the amount of spending per student. What that means is that schools that rely on adjuncts and TAs and big lecture-hall classes will rise in the rankings, and those that invest in small classes and quality instruction get short shrift. But hey, cram more Pell grant students into those lecture halls and all will be well. Oy. Maybe this will break everyone’s addiction to these ridiculous rankings.

+1
It's as if the rankings have taken out everything that matters to a good education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Idiots.

1 Princeton
2 MIT
3 (Tie) Harvard, Stanford
5 Yale
6 UPenn
7 (Tie) CalTech, Duke
9 (Tie) Brown, JHU, Northwestern
12 (Tie) Columbia, Cornell, UChicago
15 (Tie) UCLA, UCB
17 Rice
18 (Tie) Dartmouth, Vanderbilt
20 Notre Dame
21 UMich
22 Georgetown
23 UNC
24 (Tie) CMU, Emory, Virgina, WashU StL
28 UCD, UCSD, UF, USC

https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities

As a UChicago parent, this is accurate. Most of our daughter's undecided UChicago classmates were weighing UCLA, Berkeley, Michigan, UVA and Northwestern. If they got off a wait list at Duke or a low Ivy, they went to Duke or the low Ivy. Northwestern and UChicago are more or less peers; one has rah-rah Big Ten sports, the other has more "intellectual" branding.