Washington Monthly editor Paul Glastris was on last night’s Colbert Report discussing his magazine’s college rankings. The issue sparked by interest, because Dickinson’s president (Bill Durden) is a leading champion against the US News college ranking system, which has recently come under criticism.
Glastris proposed a different ranking system—asking which colleges are “best for America”—by focusing on three issues: 1) are they engines for social mobility? 2) are they doing cutting-edge research? and 3) do they inculcate an ethic of service?
So what schools come out on top in the Washington Monthly top colleges list? Their top five national universities are: MIT, UC Berkeley, Penn State, UCLA, and Texas A & M.