Best Colleges 2009

US News and World Report came out with its rankings of Best Colleges for 2009. In the "national universities" section, here is the list:

1. Harvard University (Cambridge, Mass.)

2. Princeton University (Princeton, N.J.)

3. Yale University (New Haven, Conn.)

4. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, Mass.)

(tie)4. Stanford University (Stanford, Calif.)

(tie) 6. California Institute of Technology (Pasadena, Calif.)

(tie) 6. University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, Pa.)

(tie) 8. Columbia University (New York, N.Y.) (tie)

8. Duke University (Durham, N.C.)

(tie) 8. University of Chicago (Chicago, Ill.)

(tie) 11. Dartmouth College (Hanover, N.H.)

12. Northwestern University (Evanston, Ill.)

(tie) 12. Washington University (St. Louis, Mo.) (tie)

14. Cornell University (Ithaca, N.Y.)

15. Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore, Md.)

16. Brown University (Providence, R.I.)

17. Rice University (Houston, Texas)

18. Emory University (Atlanta, Ga.)

(tie) 18. University of Notre Dame (Notre Dame, Ind.)

(tie) 18. Vanderbilt University (Nashville, Tenn.)

(tie) 21. University of California -- Berkeley (Berkeley, Calif.)

22. Carnegie Mellon University (Pittsburgh, Pa.)

23. Georgetown University (Washington, D.C.)

(tie) 23. University of Virginia (Charlottesville, Va.)

(tie) 25. University of California -- Los Angeles (Los Angeles, Calif.)

Not one of these schools has a football team worth walking across the street to watch. Not one, did you hear me Notre Dame and UCLA? What are you supposed to do on Saturday before you play quarters? I grant you UCLA, Stanford and Georgetown have good basketball programs, but, meh. And, not one of these schools (except UCLA) can boast any "scenery." Who are the three most famous Harvard women? Gertrude Stein, Janet Reno, and chalkboard-scratchingly irritating Ali McGraw in Love Story. What's a pretty girl on the Rice campus? A lost jogger, or a tourist. These are important things in deciding where to go to school, you know.

My own personal top 5 national universities:

1. Texas

2. LSU

3. Florida State

4. Louisiana-Lafayette

5. Alabama/Ole Miss (tie)