Best in the West

It may come as no surprise that Harvard and Princeton top the annual list of schools in the nation, put out by U.S. News & World Report. While Chico State didn’t make that list, it did place in the top 10 among public schools in the West. The school also made it to other top lists, including schools with high freshman retention rates (81.5 percent) and economic diversity (33 percent of students receive Pell grants). Here are the top 10 national public schools (those that include doctoral programs) and master’s universities in the West, starting with No. 1.

National
UC Berkeley
UCLA
U. of Virginia
U. of Michigan–Ann Arbor
U.N.C.–Chapel Hill
College of William and Mary
Georgia Institute of Technology
UC San Diego
U. of Illinois–Champaign-Urbana
U. of Wisconsin–Madison

West
Cal Poly San Luis Obispo
N.M. Institute of Mining & Technology
Western Washington University
CSU Long Beach
Evergreen State College
Chico State
U. of Colorado–Colorado Springs
Cal Poly Pomona
CSU Fullerton
Sonoma State