Princeton Leads U.S. News List as Dartmouth Drops From Top 10

By Janet Lorin

Photographer: Craig Warga/Bloomberg

People walk on the Princeton University campus in Princeton, New Jersey. Princeton... Read More

Princeton University again led U.S. News & World Report’s rankings of top U.S. academic research institutions, while fellow Ivy League member Dartmouth College dropped out of the Top 10.
The highest-ranking schools -- Princeton, Harvard University and Yale University -- were unchanged from the last year, according to the 2015 list released by the online magazine. The 30th edition includes data for almost 1,800 schools.
Dartmouth slipped to 11th place from a tie for 10th in the national universities category from a year earlier. Undergraduate applications dropped by 14 percent this year at the Hanover, New Hampshire-based school, amid a student outcry over
sexual harassment and reports of fraternity hazing. Student selectivity makes up 12.5 percent of the school scoring.
Weighted measures assess quality through factors like faculty resources, graduation and retention rates and “assessment of excellence,” or opinions by peers and counselors. The U.S. Education Department this year is preparing to release its own ratings, which will examine graduation rates, affordability and access for low-income students.
The magazine’s highest-ranking public university was again the University of California at Berkeley, and Williams College remained the top national liberal arts school.