These VA, DC Universities Among Best In The World: U.S. News

American universities dominate U.S. News & World Report’s rankings of 2020’s best global universities, a list that evaluates 1,500 schools across the globe on academic research and reputation.

According to the rankings, eight of the world’s top 10 best universities are in the United States. Overall, 249 schools in the United States — the most of any country— made the list, including seven schools in Virginia and five in DC.

The global rankings differ from U.S. News’ rankings of the best colleges and best graduate schools. The publication explains that no data from either of those two lists factors in compiling the global university rankings.

Harvard University ranked no.1 on the list, followed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, University of California at Berkeley and Oxford University in the United Kingdom.

U.S. News stresses that the newly released rankings specifically focus on academic research and overall reputation of the schools and not on the undergraduate and graduate programs. In the global rankings, schools are also assessed in subjects like business, economics, engineering and computer science. The individual subject rankings are intended to measure a school’s global position in a field.

The Virginia and DC colleges on U.S. News’ list are:

49. University of Virginia

79. Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University

81. George Washington University

92. Georgetown University

113. Virginia Commonwealth University

119. George Mason University

132. William & Mary

162. American University

172. Old Dominion University

177. Howard University

216. Catholic University of America

221. Eastern Virginia Medical School

“As the Best Global Universities rankings continue to expand in number of schools and subjects to fulfill the needs of prospective students, we remain consistent in our mission to evaluate schools around the world on their research,” Robert Morse, chief data strategist at U.S. News, said in a press release. “A major emphasis on academic research is what sets this methodology apart from our other university rankings.”

See all of 2020’s top global universities via U.S. News & World Report.