In regards to physics and in general, which of the following would you rank most prestigious to least prestigious on an international level and national level: Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, Rice, and Washington University in St. Louis?
For Physics, Cornell > JHU = NU = Rice > WUSTL.
Overall, I think Cornell = JHU = NU > Rice = WUSTL
For grad school? Usually when you look at departments you are talking about grad school. These college you mention all among the best universities in the country and will have across the board strength. In the US, only about 1/3 to 1/2 at most classes are taken in your major so being overall strong is a feature. I don’t know that you can really break out ‘prestige’ of an undergrad dept. Students who want to work in the field of physics will usually have to go to grad school for that. Any of these unis will prepare you for grad school. You can get involved in research at any of them.
That said I would think Cornell has the highest overseas reputation and likely scores high in ranks internationally for overall and for the Physics grad program.
When I was in South Korea, it seemed like Johns Hopkins was the most well-known, followed by Cornell and Rice. WUSTL wasn’t even a blip on the radar.
What are you looking to do?
I have a PhD in Astrophysics.
For PhD programs in physics, Cornell is top 10, and the others are all very strong, in the 15-30 range nationally.
For undergrad, they are all pretty much on the same level… you won’t have any problem getting a rigorous physics education at any of them, and they are very well respected by employers and graduate schools.
This is for undergraduate school @BrownParent Which of these will it be easiest for me to get into for research you would say?
@Irreplaceable Interesting, what about Northwestern? Northwestern is ranked higher than all of these schools in US News, however I never heard of Northwestern until I was a sophomore, but possibly that is just me being very ignorant.
I don’t really know how well-known Northwestern is in SK. I’m sure academics and people interested in college in the US know about it, but it seemed like the most famous American schools there were Stanford, the Ivy League, MIT, the top UCs, Johns Hopkins, NYU, and Boston University/Boston College (some people mixed the two up lol). Highly regarded schools in the US like Vanderbilt, Emory, WUSTL, etc, weren’t really brought up. There is probably just a bias for schools on both coasts.
I didn’t know about WUSTL or UChicago until I started applying to colleges so I was pretty clueless too 
“Northwestern is ranked higher than all of these schools…”
No. I mean, sure US News World Report has some magazines to sell that says so, but it doesn’t make it true.
If you look at the rankings, all of these schools are within a few of each other… you are deluding yourself if you think schools can be ranked with that sort of accuracy or precision. They can’t.
All these schools are of similar caliber, selectivity, quality, reputation.
Just generically, and I have nothing but anecdotal personal experience to reflect upon, having spent a fair amount of my career overseas, JHU, would be the one that has the most name recognition. Both it’s medical school and public health have both an international reputation and experience.
@Irreplaceable In Europe, Emory is well-regarded I know that.
@harvardandberkeley I agree with you about that, however some schools are ranked much higher than I would think given how prestigious, I think the public perceives them (e.g. Norte Dame and USC)
@boolaHI Where have you spent time overseas, if you do not mind me asking? I suppose by international, I refer more to Europe than anything. That is my bad for not being clear.
Europe, S. America and Asia. I will preface that much of the work was with both the UN and US State Department, and thus these specific fields/professionals may have just more inherent knowledge of JHU.
Johns hopkins>Cornell>NU>Rice>WUSTL international prestige
Cornell>NU>JHU>Rice>WUSTL domestic prestige
Is there a significant drop off between Johns Hopkins and Cornell in international prestige or is it negligible?
A prestige comparison is the worst because there’s literally no factual evidence or proof behind the posts besides the people’s personal opinions. IMO order of prestige goes in order like this: Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, WUSTL, and Rice.
Keep in mind that prestige is no way to base the quality of a school, the strength of the academics in the department, or the suitability of the school.
Why do you need ‘most prestigious’? Do you think that is what grad school go on or something? I already stated that you can get a good preparation at any of those unis. They all have opportunities for undergraduate reserach. You might like to read the department pages and see what they say.
You might be interested in what grad school look for and Cornell’s page has some info for applying to US grad schools.
http://www.physics.cornell.edu/resources/physics-careers/grad-school/
Every one of those colleges is well-respected. Nobody can answer your question definitively, because it is a subjective, qualitative assessment. The “Ranking” publications are created to sell a new edition annually. They could not do that if the rankings remained static. You might see one of them ranked higher than another, but that won’t help if you are applying to a job where your boss has a different preference based on his or her own experiences and observations. They are all superb. Don’t believe anybody who tells you that one is significantly superior to another for undergraduates. There may be differences for specific course-work, but I will already warn you that a blind, persistent fixation on “prestige” will diminish others’ respect for you, because it makes it sound as if you care more about a superficial “brand name” than you do about actual academic excellence.
And this is why I asked what you want to do.
If you want to become a research scientist, using prestige (and especially international prestige) to differentiate between these schools is completely the wrong way to approach your college search (because grad schools in the US would not care a bit which of these you went to for undergrad).