For at least this year a west coast school can claim supremacy over what is usually viewed as eastern academic superiority. Stanford university in Palo Alto, CA has been named the top university in the country by a recent Forbes list.
The list focused on the areas of Student Satisfaction, Post-Graduate Success, Graduation Rate, Nationally Competitive Awards, and Student Debt. Forbes editor Michael Noer made sure to emphasize that the areas being assessed not only deal with the experience offered by the institutions, but also their economic viability.
“Our college rankings were created to inform consumers about the quality of the educational experience and our brand new financial health grades give insight into which schools will be around for the long-haul.”
In claiming the number one spot Stanford dethroned Ivy League titan Princeton University, which fell to the third slot.
Second place also went to a west coast institution in Pomona College. The private, liberal arts college is located in Clermont California and boasts a student population under two-thousand.
The rest of the top ten is rounded out by Yale, Columbia, Swarthmore College, The United States Military Academy, Harvard, Williams College, and MIT.
The issue, which will be released early next month, will also include rankings of the best public, private, and value schools. Forbes’ coverage will also include an interactive tool called “Find Your Top Colleges” that will allow students to find their best matches based upon their test scores, GPA, and other factors such as region.