As an Ivy League College Counselor who has visited the TOP 25 Colleges and Universities, I am pleased to see the Forbes Magazine new ranking of colleges.
U.S News & World Report and Newsweek come out with rankings each year; however, Forbes is applying a never used before formula in their ranking system which is based on the quality of the education received and successful careers after graduation.
Parents spending over $50,000 per year at private institutions should be very interested in this new ranking system. Bravo to the Forbes Magazine.
Forbes College Rankings Background
2008 marked the first year that Forbes entered the college ranking fray. They choose to use a methodology that included the following percentages:
Listing of Alumni in the 2008 Who’s Who in America (25%)
Student evaluations of professors from Ratemyprofessors.com (25%)
Four-year graduation rates (16 2/3%)
Enrollment-adjusted numbers of students and faculty receiving nationally Competitive awards (16 2/3%)
Average four year accumulated student debt of those borrowing money (16 2/3%)
Forbes did not break colleges down into different schools as U.S. News & World Report does, but instead choose to separate private and public colleges.
Complete College Rankings Methodology
Forbes inaugurated its first ranking of America’s Best Colleges in 2008. They based 25 percent of their rankings on seven million student evaluations of courses and instructors. Another 25 percent depended upon how many of the school’s alumni are listed among the notable people in Who’s Who in America. The other half of the ranking was based equally on three factors: the average amount of student debt at graduation held by those who borrowed; the percentage of students graduating in four years; and the number of students or faculty, adjusted for enrollment, who have won nationally competitive awards like Rhodes Scholarships or Nobel Prizes. CCAP ranked only the top 15 percent or so of all undergraduate institutions.
Top Private Colleges.
America's Best Colleges shows the top twenty-five private colleges compiled from the complete college rankings listed above. Each college slide reveals its overall rank, cost, class size, student to faculty ratio, SAT and ACT ranges, percentage of applicants admitted, application deadline and early admission dates. Cost includes tuition, room and board, books, fees and other expenses.
via Forbes Magazine America's Best Colleges
Forbes College Rankings - Best Colleges In The USA
Forbes List Of Top 25 Colleges for 2011
Before forming Ivy League Placement, I was a Director of College Counseling in both California and New York City. Always tuned into how Colleges are ranked, The Forbes College Ranking list for 2011 was anticipated and of great interest. Usually the top school list started with Harvard, Yale and Princeton, while the list of universities and liberal arts colleges almost always began with Williams, Amherst and Swarthmore.
This year I find the Forbes List of the Best Colleges in the USA to be a refreshing change as it includes a different perspective and some of my favorite choices.
I have visited these Top 25 Colleges. All have their own unique characteristics. Among my favorites is the University of Chicago. My former students all know, if I had my life to live over again, I would attend the University of Chicago and I am pleased it made it into the Forbes List of Top 25 Colleges!
1 Williams College MA
2 Princeton University NJ
3 Amherst College MA
4 US Military Academy NY
5 MIT MA
6 Stanford University CA
7 Swarthmore College PA
8 Harvard University MA
9 Claremont McKenna College CA
10 Yale University CT
11 US Air Force Academy CO
12 Wellesley College MA
13 Columbia University NY
14 Haverford College PA
15 Wesleyan University CT
16 Whitman College WA
17 Pomona College CA
18 Northwestern University IL
19 California Institute of Technology
20 University of Chicago IL
21 Carleton College MN
22 Harvey Mudd College CA
23 Vassar College NY
24 Centre College KY
25 Rice University TX
via Forbes Magazine
