60 Most Selective Colleges & Universities

What is Selectivity?

Selectivity is simply a measure of how hard it is to be accepted at a university. Different universities have different standards for admissions, but the most selective American universities look for applicants with high grades (GPA), a challenging academic curriculum, and (usually) high SAT or ACT test scores, as well as strong recommendations, essays, and extracurricular activities. To put it shortly, the most selective universities want the best students.

Diversity and the student experience

While many students are wrapped up in getting in and rankings, they often forget to give thought to their college experience. Diversity is a big part of the college experience for many students, and it's even more important at small colleges in more rural settings. Data is great, but make sure you try to visit some of the colleges that you are interested in and get an idea of how you find the campus environment & culture.

Whether or not a college has you major is clearly an important part of your college, but too often we see students discount liberal arts colleges because they don't have a specific major such as biochemistry or accounting. In fact, You will notice that none of these liberal arts colleges have common professional programs like Architecture, Health, and Law Enforcement, and few have programs in Engineering, Agriculture, Education, Communications, or even Business.

Before you stop considering liberal arts colleges, remember that the strength of these colleges is the high quality, holistic education that they provide. Liberal arts colleges teach you how to think, read, and write at the highest language-- and you can apply these skills to be successful in any professional field. Liberal Arts graduates often study the basic fields such as biology instead of environmental science, or English instead of communications and find that they are well prepared to make the jump into the professional world or into more specific graduate programs.