Harvard is No Longer Among Top Colleges in USA 2022

August 31, 2022

Last Updated Date: August 31, 2022

Harvard university — Harvard University. Photo: Boston Globe

Harvard is often mentioned when people talk about college admission in the best universities in the world, especially in the United States. When we were kids, TV and movie characters wanted to go to that school, which made it seem even harder to get in: who could get in? Only the best students who would go on to do well in life. But things have changed over time, and now Forbes magazine says that the university is not in the top 10 of the best schools.

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Forbes puts out a list of top colleges in USA 2022 every year. Harvard was number one from 2017 to 2019, but it didn’t make the 10 top colleges in USA 2022. Instead, Harvard is now at the top. Institute of Technology in Massachusetts (better known as MIT).

His report says that graduates of MIT, a private school, make a lot of money. It is said that a graduate with a six-year degree makes $98,100 a year, and that after ten years, that number goes up to $173,700. As well, its graduates who took out school loans were able to pay them off quickly, and many of them went on to get doctoral degrees.

The median wage for an MIT graduate six years after graduation is $98,100. Graduates of the private college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, go on to earn large salaries. The average MIT graduate earns $173,700 ten years after graduation. Only 8% of MIT students borrow student loans to pay for their education, and those who do do so swiftly pay them off. More than 200 graduates pursue doctoral degrees each year. 56 MIT grads can be found on the Forbes American Leaders list, which evaluates the leadership and business achievement of a university’s graduates.

The university’s generally remarkable three-year average retention rate has dropped from 98% last year to approximately 90% as only 76% of former freshmen returned to Harvard for their second year in the autumn of 2020, according to the most recent federal data. Yale University, a fellow member of the Ivy League that fell six points in our rankings this year, had its retention percentage plummet to 65% in fall 2020 from 99% the previous year. 83% of Princeton University’s former freshmen returned for the autumn semester (No. 4).

In contrast, MIT maintained 98% of their freshmen sophomores in the fall of 2020, consistently ranking among the greatest retention rates of any college in the United States. The college’s three-year retention rate remained constant at about 99%. At the University of California, Berkeley (No. 2) and Rice University, respectively, 97% and 96% of former freshmen returned in the fall of 2020. (No. 12).

In addition to pandemic-weary retention rates, Harvard received a low Pell index ranking from Forbes. Forbes started doing this last year, and it helps us understand how effectively a college prepares and graduates low-income students by taking a look at results for Pell Grant recipients. In order to determine which institutions best act as engines of economic mobility, we also reward colleges that enroll a higher percentage of low-income students. The Pell index, which accounts for 5% of our ranking model, is calculated by multiplying the institution’s percentage of Pell Grant participants by the institution’s six-year graduation rate for Pell Grant recipients.

The issue is not that low-income Harvard students are unsuccessful—they are successful. A measure created by the think tank Third Way to determine the return on investment for students at a specific college, the price-to-earnings premium, places Harvard in the top percentile. The university’s six-year Pell graduation rate is 97%, just one percentage point lower than the rate for all students.

However, Harvard doesn’t enroll many Pell Grant recipients compared to other Ivy League schools and many of the other colleges on our list, which means that the benefits of a Harvard degree are only accessible to a small number of low-income students. Only 11% of the university’s undergraduate students got Pell Grants during the school year 2020–21. Harvard and the University of Chicago share the distinction of having the lowest enrollment of Pell students among Forbes’ top 25 universities. Comparatively, Pell Grants are awarded to 21% of Princeton undergraduates, 18% of Yale undergraduates, 16% of Dartmouth undergraduates, and 13% of Brown undergraduates. One in four students at the typical college on our list receives a Pell Grant.

Forbes says that the retention rate is one reason why Harvard is no longer on the list of best universities. During the Covid pandemic, many Ivy League universities also saw their retention rates drop. Some international students couldn’t travel, and some decided to take a break from school. 98% of MIT’s students came back for their second year, while only 76% of its students did.

Also, because of changes in how Forbes ranks schools, Harvard is no longer in the top 10. The magazine now gives more weight to schools with more low-income students in order to “find out which ones are better for economic mobility. In other words, a school that helps students who aren’t from a privileged class is now seen more favorably and gives them more chances. Because of this, there are more public universities in the top.

After the first site, the next four are the University of California-Berkeley, Stanford University, Princeton University, and Columbia University. Their numbers are similar to MIT’s, and some of them were named as the schools that have produced the most billionaires.