How come Princeton is 1 but Harvard is 16, Williams is 36 but Amherst is 70?
The methodology for this ranking is different than other rankings. It is focused more on ‘Money’ types of things like post grad outcomes, graduation rates, alumni networks etc. Things like scores and admit rates, less emphasized.
Because when the writers though darts against the wall, that’s where they landed. 
Like many “rankings,” take with a very large grain of salt.
“MONEY analyzed graduation rates, tuition charges, family borrowing, and alumni earnings (plus 22 other data points) to find the country’s top values.”
Most interesting result for me… Ramapo College of NJ @ 113, who placed above the following name schools seen here often…
Lehigh - 117
Northeastern - 123
Franklin & Marshall - 124
Bucknell - 125
Emory - 128
Washington U - 129
Colby - 130
Harvey Mudd - 132
Villlanova - 153
Carnegie Melon - 155
Case Western - 177
Rochester - 182
Dickinson - 192
Kenyon - 214
Carleton - 244
I find the “top value” type ratings to be extremely YMMV. Most seem to base their rankings on average financial aid, so they are really only accurate if you’re getting the average aid that they used (including the average mix of loans, grants, work/study, and merit). P
Also…take note…all of,the public universities list the IN state costs…not the out of state costs. Geez.
What does “YMMV” mean?
Well, if you put max weight on “How important is it that you graduate with little or no student debt?”, “How important is it that the college helps you land a high-paying job?”, and “How important will merit aid and academic scholarships be?” and zero weight on “How important will need-based financial aid be for your family?”, Harvard ends up #4 and Princeton ends up #8 (Cooper Union, which graduates a large percentage of engineers and gives half-tuition scholarships to everyone, is #1; Rice, which is also STEM-heavy and relatively generous with merit compared to other Ivy/equivalent peers, is #2; Duke, which is probably the only Ivy-equivalent (besides Rice) that gives a decent number of huge merit scholarships is #3). Stanford is #9, Cal #11, Caltech #12, Mudd #13
So it seems like Princeton is better with fin aid than Harvard.
Under these weights, Amherst and Williams are both quite a ways down the list, with Amherst (between Brown and Kenyon) 16 places above Williams (between UW-Seattle and Dordt).
Your Mileage May Vary.
It’s a pretty terrible list. I tried to parse the metrics they were using and it’s still unclear if there’s any rule beneath this mess. None of the columns displayed sort to the order assigned, and some obvious schools that you might look for are missing. That may be due to the “sufficient, reliable data” standard, but then some schools in the list don’t have the basic info for all fields. Simple example: if you want low borrowing, guaranteed job after graduation and great social mobility with top academics you might consider including service academies. If you are willing to include California state schools with median ACT of 17 (California State University-Dominguez Hills ?) then why not Minn State Univ - Mankato which is very comparable in almost every number?
I’m guessing that a huge number of popular, affordable and broadly achievable schools were lost due to the “graduation rate that was at or above the median for its institutional category” rule. It’s one thing to ding a school’s ranking based on student outcomes, but it’s quite another to exclude them from the list completely. I’d rather know that a school has a problem and ranks poorly on my scale than not know why it’s missing or that it even exists at all. It’s a goofy editorial choice since the list isn’t any more manageable at 800 than it would have been at 1200 or 1800 names.
This list makes no sense. For example:
Total Sticker Cost vs Real Cost after Grant
UCI: $34,700 $14,800 (ave grant $19,900)
Stanford: $70,800 $17,900 (ave grant $52,900)
UCI doesn’t give everybody $20k (on average), neither does Stanford give everybody $53k.
It’s a ridiculous list. The service academies should be at the top if the metrics include graduation rates and level of debt. Our kid is getting paid to go to college and will graduate with no debt and a guaranteed job. Though the academies and civilian colleges are apples and oranges on most other metrics, they can’t be beat on the money metric IMO.
From the Stanford website:
https://financialaid.stanford.edu/undergrad/how/index.html
The operative words being: “need-based aid recipients”
My D got Rice’s best Merit scholarship but it was still 10K+ a year more than Princeton. For straightforward FA cases Princeton has the best need-based aid. As mention YMMV because the rankings are based on averages. I suppose Rice’s philosophy is to give out more smaller amounts than a few FT type scholarships. Their tuition is also about 10K lower than most places keeping their COA down for more people. Do they mention if they exclude Athletic scholarships from schools like Rice, Stanford, Duke, Vandy, etc?
^ Yes, it is among certain recipients.
@Dolemite: No idea.
The list I created is with max weight on merit money and zero weight on fin aid.
It’s because rankings are basically pointless. All they amount to are glorified opinions. I have an opinion too. The only difference is that these places have the money to publish these opinions on the media as if they’re somehow facts. What we’re seeing is one subjective opinion disagreeing with another subjective opinion. My advice is to stop relying on rankings and figure out what your ambitions are, then choose a school that works for you. Otherwise, you’re just comparing apples to Chevys.
It’s a silly list. All the rankings are problematic, but this one makes less sense than most. Look at it through the lens of some schools you know well and your head will explode.
I don’t think it’s a terrible list at all. Would be pointless for my oldest son who wanted an English major, but works great for my civil engineering son. That’s the thing about lists…each list has it’s own criteria and weights. I agree with Purple Titan…this list fits a stem person etc. etc. And instate colleges should use instate COA in calculations…that’s the point of having state universities (as opposed to national universities).
To be fair, compared to Harvard, Princeton is smaller, COA is lower, financial aid is higher, alumni is more loyal, class size is smaller, student bond is tighter, etc etc so it makes more sense to put it higher. I guess if a financial publication is creating a balance sheet, they are factoring in right values.
This list may isn’t perfect but not any worse than other rankings.