There is a group of public universities in the US which has well-known, phenomenal programs, regardless of USN rankings. Also, there is a group called the Public Ivies. UVA is surely in both of those. Many of my friends in China applying to US schools–and China only cares about PERCEIVED prestige among their relationships in China–UC Berkeley, UCLA usually are the only schools anyone has every heard of and influences application numbers. UVA, University of Texas at Austin, University of Washington…phenomenal schools, faculty, endowments, etc.