UVA, Virginia Tech, VCU Among Best Global Universities: U.S. News

VIRGINIA — The University of Virginia and Virginia Tech are among Virginia schools included on this year’s list of the best universities in the world, according to a new ranking by U.S. News & World Report released Tuesday.

The publication’s 2023 Best Global Universities list ranks more than 2,000 schools in dozens of countries based on academic research and reputation.

Overall, 95 countries are represented on the 2023 list.

"The Best Global Universities rankings offer prospective students a valuable resource for exploring higher education options outside of their home country," Robert Morse, chief data strategist at U.S. News, said in a news release. "Over the past nine years, these rankings have expanded to include more schools and more subjects, while maintaining a consistent focus on institutions that prioritize academic research."

The University of Virginia was the highest-ranked school in Virginia to make this year’s list of the best global universities.

Located in Charlottesville, the University of Virginia is a public institution founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson. It has a total undergraduate enrollment of 17,299.

UVA’s graduate programs include the highly ranked Darden Graduate School of Business, Curry School of Education, School of Engineering and Applied Science, School of Law and School of Medicine.

Overall, the university ranked 119th on this year’s list.

Also included in this year’s list of the best universities in the world are:

• Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, ranked 265th
• Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, ranked 439th
• George Mason University in Fairfax, ranked 478th
• William & Mary in Williamsburg, ranked 624th.

Other Virginia universities and colleges that made the list are Old Dominion University, Eastern Virginia Medical School and James Madison University.

This year’s list ranked an additional 250 schools, up from 1,750 last year.

Colleges in the United States secured four of the top five spots on the 2022 list. Harvard University came in at No. 1, followed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, and the University of California - Berkeley at No. 2, 3, and 4, respectively. Rounding out the top five is the United Kingdom’s University of Oxford.

This year, the United States had 280 universities in the overall ranking, surpassed only by China’s 338 universities. Other countries with the most schools on the list include:

• Japan: 105
• United Kingdom: 92
• India: 81

To determine which schools make the list, U.S. News analyzes data and metrics provided by global analytics company Clarivate, including student-to-faculty ratio and number of degrees awarded.

Researchers also used 13 separate ranking factors and focused on each institution’s research performance.

Read more about the Best Global Universities methodology.

U.S. News also added five additional subject metrics for 2023, according to a release, including artificial intelligence, education and educational research, meteorology and atmospheric sciences, and water resources.

See this full list of this year’s Best Global Universities.

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