US News & World Report released its 2023 college rankings earlier this evening and Princeton University maintained its stranglehold on the top spot for the twelfth consecutive year. However, one did not have to look far to find changes to this year’s rankings. Last year’s three-way tie for second place was broken when MIT claimed sole possession of the spot it previously shared with Harvard and Columbia.
Princeton was ranked the top college for the twelfth consecutive year!
There is still a three-way tie this year. It simply moved from the second spot to the third spot. Those three schools are Harvard, Yale, and Stanford.
Columbia dropped all the way to number 18 this year. This wasn’t completely unexpected given the recent rankings scandal and US News’ decision to quietly “unrank” Columbia this summer. We expect Columbia to rejoin the top ten when the “dust settles” on its currently litigious situation.
Williams, Amherst, and Pomona were ranked one, two, and three, respectively for liberal arts colleges. (You will have to scroll down to the sixth-ranked schools to find your first three-way tie in the liberal arts rankings this year.)
Last, but certainly not least, UC Berkeley and UCLA tied for first place while the University of Michigan and the University of Virginia tied for third place.
We recognize that we acquire a mostly large new group of readers each admission season. Accordingly, we will conclude this blog the way we have historically when we blog about rankings. (We will try to keep it brief.) Please, please, please don’t read too much into any of the rankings. Instead, you should select your target list of schools based on your personal fit. The criteria you use to select your preferred schools are likely different than any of the myriad published rankings systems. Additionally, the rankings can — and do — change every year. We don’t want anyone to be less than satisfied at graduation should their school have dropped in whatever rankings system they most closely follow.
