Applying to college is a journey that involves finding the right school, submitting applications, and then, if you're lucky, choosing among the acceptance letters to find your home away from home for the next few years. To put you on that path, each year, U.S. News surveys more than 1,600 colleges and universities and ranks them in different categories according to our methodology.
Here, we offer a sneak peek of the 2012 Best Colleges rankings.
In alphabetical order, these are the top 25 schools in the National Universities category:
| School (State) |
|---|
| Brown University (RI) |
| California Institute of Technology |
| Carnegie Mellon University (PA) |
| Columbia University (NY) |
| Cornell University (NY) |
| Dartmouth College (NH) |
| Duke University (NC) |
| Emory University (GA) |
| Georgetown University (DC) |
| Harvard University (MA) |
| Johns Hopkins University (MD) |
| Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| Northwestern University (IL) |
| Princeton University (NJ) |
| Rice University (TX) |
| Stanford University (CA) |
| University of California—Berkeley |
| University of California—Los Angeles |
| University of Chicago |
| University of Notre Dame (IN) |
| University of Pennsylvania |
| University of Southern California |
| Vanderbilt University (TN) |
| University of Virginia |
| Wake Forest University (NC) |
| Washington University in St. Louis |
| Yale University (CT) |
(Note: due to ties, there are more than 25 schools listed here.)
The actual ranking of these and other schools will be available Sept. 13, 2011 on usnews.com.
Access the U.S. News College Compass to find complete rankings and much more.
Reader Comments Read all comments (2)
darius of IL 12:01AM September 13, 2011
dsafds of AL 11:39PM September 12, 2011