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US News & World Report: 2018 Best Private Universities

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Princeton keeps the crown, and Georgetown leads the D.C. pack in the 2018 U.S. News rankings.

U.S. News & World Report dropped its 2018 Best Colleges rankings on September 12, grading more than 1,800 accredited schools nationwide on everything from graduation rates to alumni giving. WTOP’s local breakdown zeroed in on how the 13 ranked universities across the greater Washington, D.C. region stacked up against the private powerhouses that, once again, ran the table at the top of the National Universities list.

• Princeton University held the No. 1 spot in National Universities for the seventh straight year, with Harvard right behind at No. 2 and Chicago and Yale tied at No. 3.
• Georgetown University was the top-ranked school in the D.C. area, landing at No. 20 nationally, while the University of Virginia came in at No. 25 overall and No. 3 among public national universities.
• For the first time, U.S. News built PayScale’s postgraduate salary data into school profiles, showing median starting pay for graduates zero to five years out.

The Ivy League Sweep at the Top

The National Universities category was, as usual, a private-school affair from top to bottom. Princeton’s seventh consecutive No. 1 finish anchored a leaderboard that saw Harvard slot in at No. 2, with the University of Chicago and Yale tying for third. Columbia, MIT and Stanford tied at No. 5, Penn came in at No. 8, Duke at No. 9, and Caltech rounded out the top 10.

That lineup mirrors the same names that have circled the top of the rankings for years, a reflection of how U.S. News weighs the 15 factors that go into the formula — graduation and first-year retention rates, undergraduate academic reputation, faculty resources, student selectivity, financial resources, alumni giving, and graduation-rate performance among them.

Princeton’s seventh straight year at No. 1 — the same private-school names, the same order, the same lock on the top of the list.

Georgetown and UVA Carry the D.C. Region

Among the 13 ranked schools in the Washington, D.C. metro area, Georgetown was the clear standout, cracking the top 20 nationally at No. 20. The University of Virginia, just down the road in Charlottesville, finished at No. 25 overall — good enough for No. 3 among public national universities, trailing only the perennial leaders in that category.

That split — a private Jesuit university leading locally while a flagship public school posts the best public-school finish in the region — tracks with the divide that runs through the entire ranking: private research universities dominate the very top of the National Universities list, while strong public flagships compete in their own separate lane.

Salary Data Enters the Formula

The 2018 edition marked the first time U.S. News folded PayScale’s postgraduate salary figures directly into individual school profiles, giving prospective students a look at median starting earnings for graduates in their first zero to five years out of school. It’s a shift that speaks to a broader push in higher-education coverage — the kind that shows up in economics reporting more broadly — toward measuring return on investment rather than just prestige and selectivity.

Combined with the existing 15 weighted measures, the addition gave families another data point to weigh against sticker price, particularly at private institutions where tuition sits well above the national average.

For a D.C.-area audience, the takeaway was straightforward: Georgetown remains the region’s top-ranked school by a wide margin, UVA is still the strongest public option nearby, and the same handful of Ivy League and elite private schools — Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Chicago — continue to occupy the spots everyone else is chasing.