What I found useful about the USNWR rankings is that they’re a rough proxy for admissions selectivity. A student can find match schools 10-30 places down from their dream school or likelies another 10-30 down from those (adjust the numbers as necessary for your particular kid). Often these schools, particularly the LACs, are ones families don’t know about because they’re not located in their region. From there you need to do your homework and not assume that a school ranked 27th is somehow better than one ranked 32nd in any meaningful way.