This isn’t an official list (just my opinion), and I would love to hear what anyone else thinks!
I am aware that there’s a list of “state ivies,” but since that list was made, I feel like other colleges should be added (and maybe some taken off, lol). So here goes my list:
University of Michigan
University of Virginia
University of California, Berkeley & Los Angeles
University of Texas, Austin
University of Illinois, UC
University of Washington, Seattle
University of Wisconsin, Madison
University of Florida
University of Georgia (maybe?)
I think for undergrad it goes like this – and I count research output and opportunities, Nobels, and grad school rankings (because it does impact undergrad quality) more than US News does:
Berkeley
Michigan
Virginia
UCLA
Wisconsin
North Carolina
Illinois
Washington
Georgia Tech
Texas
William & Mary
Minnesota
UCSD
Purdue
Indiana
Ohio State
Penn State
Maryland
Pitt
The next UC (Davis? SB?)
Florida
The next UC
Texas A&M
Iowa
VA Tech
Honestly, I think after about the top 20 or so, it becomes pretty hard to differentiate them. At that point I start looking for schools that have highly ranked departments, like Iowa’s writing/lit and solid social sciences or aTm and VA Tech’s good engineering departments.
Also, some runner ups from the original list I saw included Binghamton U… I feel like there isn’t a SUNY college that would make the list (and I go to SUNY Albany)… thoughts on this?
No University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill on the OP’s list? One of the original Public Ivies, 2 Nobel Prize Laureates, 49 Rhodes Scholars, 37 Luce Scholars, 44 Goldwater Scholars, more than 250 Fulbright Student Program Awards. Better academically than several schools on the OP’s list.
@JMM72493 : By student standardized test scoring, Binghamton would place above fully half of the schools on the OP’s list, so by this objective criterion the school should at least be noted.
Similarly, by test scores, G-tech reports the highest range of any public university in the country, and should be acknowledged for this reason.
The absent UMD also reports high student test scores.
really? binghamton students have higher standardized test scores? that’s something i did not know! do you know where to find this information? also yes, forgot to mention the University of Maryland
At one of the state schools listed high on that (Business insider) list, scores for at least one third of the students (probably much more than that) are not included in the published ranges that the school uses in its PR (and CDS) materials. Missing are scores for International students, EOP students, transfers, and Advantage students among others. This school has markedly increased the number of students whose scores can remain out of the calculated totals-thereby continuing to give the appearance of a school that accepts only students with top scores-not true!
But even if that were not the case, it seems more important to look at the experience that they school provides to the student rather than looking at the scores that students bring to the school.
