There is no doubt that the top school Princeton, Harvard, and Yale are not among the best Universities in the country, but there is always a bias of private institutions over public institutions and a great deal of weight is giving to opinion and not on actual quantifiable data.

Good Luck!!!

Some people in Ivys end up not getting that good of an education because they slack off – they worked so hard to get into the school, they figure that once they’re in they’re golden. Whereas someone at a less well known school can get an excellent education because they work hard at the school and interact more regularly with their professors.

Also, what is considered a “best college” might not be the best college for your specialty. For example, Harvard is an amazing school but if you’re going for anything technical related, why aren’t you at MIT?

That being said, here are some (but not all) commonly accepted “top tier” schools. (w = women’s college)

Private: Harvard, Cornell, Yale, Columbia, Dartmouth, Princeton, Stanford, Brown, University of Pennsylvania, Mt. Holyoke (w), Wellsley (w), Smith (w), Vassar, Vanderbilt, MIT, Harvey Mudd, Amherst

Public: UC Berkeley, UC Michigan at Ann Arbor, University of Virginia, University of Wisconsin at Madison, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, Penn State