Dive Brief:
- U.S. News & World Report’s 2016 rankings place Princeton and the University of California-Berkeley at the top of the private and public national university lists, respectively, with Williams College and the United States Naval Academy as the top private and public liberal arts colleges.
- The Best Value Schools list for private national universities closely reflects the best overall list, but on the liberal arts side, Soka University of America and Vassar College are new names on the list.
- The 2016 rankings also include lists of the most innovative schools, the best colleges for veterans, A-plus Schools for B Students, and the schools with the most international students, the most economic diversity, the best undergraduate business programs, and the best undergraduate engineering programs.
Dive Insight:
U.S. News & World Report rankings have been consistently denounced by researchers as destructive and misleading since they were first released in 1983. The ranking methodology has shifted over the years and most recently has raised the stakes with increased focus on graduation and retention rates. The rankings are most often criticized for factoring reputation too largely into its rankings, relying on the perceptions of college administrators and high school guidance counselors about quality.
Regardless of the criticism, however, students continue to say the rankings factor heavily into their application decisions, and they continue to contribute to decision-making on college campuses nationwide.