By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
Forbes Magazine came out with its’ rankings of the nation’s universities and colleges. Most of the names in the top twenty (with a couple of exceptions) were what most of us would expect. Princeton took the top college title this year. They were followed by Princeton, Williams College, Stanford, the University of Chicago, Yale, Harvard, the United States Military Academy (West Point), Columbia, Pomona, Swarthmore, MIT, Notre Dame, Amherst, Bowdoin, Washington and Lee, Wellesly, Penn, the California Institute of Technology, Brown, and Vasser. Washington and Lee University in Virginia is the top Southern School followed by Duke in North Carolina at #24 and Davidson College in North Carolina at #30. What was disappointing to many is how poorly the Alabama colleges and Universities performed.
The top SEC school is (of course ) Vanderbilt at #33. The highest ranked school with a ~state of Alabama style focus on football is the University of Florida at #80. Conservative Hillsdale College weighs in at a respectable #82 in the Country. The University of Southern California is far from being the highest ranked school in their state but they still posted a respectable #95. Texas is #104. Millsaps College in Mississippi is #122. Georgia comes in at #125. Tulane is #129 and the University of Miami is #132. New SEC member Texas A&M comes in at #149. Transylvania University in Kentucky soundly scored ahead of all the Alabama colleges and Universities at #186.
The highest ranked college in the state of Alabama is Birmingham Southern College at # 211. The 1305 student college near Legion Field ranked in between the University of Oregon and Dayton. Clemson is #218. The United States Merchant Marine Academy is #233. Samford in Homewood finished at # 241, behind the University of Delaware, but they are the second highest ranked college or university in the state of Alabama. Arkansas at #263 and Ole Miss at #270 edged out Auburn University at just # 271. The Tigers were followed closely by their rivals at the University of Alabama at #274. LSU is the #299 ranked school in the country. Tennessee is #365. The University of Alabama at Huntsville is #379. Mississippi State is ranked #397. The University of Kentucky is number 410. Oral Roberts in Oklahoma is #436. Louisiana Tech is # 503. Southern Miss is #517 and is cheaper than UAB at # 527. UAB is the largest employer in the state of Alabama, but Illinois College, Drexel, and Montana Tech of the University of Montana all ranked ahead of UAB. Jackson State in Mississippi is #530. The University of South Alabama is #545. Tuskegee University is #621 and Troy University is #636.
The state of Alabama excels in football, but according to Forbes not so much in the actual classrooms.
To see the Forbes Rankings in their entirety:
http://www.forbes.com/top-colleges/list/#p_1_s_a0_All%20states_
