University of Iowa and Iowa State University drop in U.S. News & World Report global ranks

In the most recent U.S. News & World Report, the University of Iowa fell 45 spots in Best Global Universities Rankings, while Iowa State University's ranking dropped 81 spots.

The University of Iowa ranked 180th in last year's list, but fell to 225th in 2024. Iowa State University was ranked 263rd in 2023 and is now ranked 344th.

The list of the Best Global Universities considered 2,250 college campuses in 104 countries, while last year's list only evaluated 2,000 universities in 95 countries.

The University of Northern Iowa was not included in the ranking either year.

U.S. News and World rankings include strict criteria

The U.S. News and World Report's Best Global University rankings assess the quality of international universities based on 13 key metrics.

These metrics include:

Global research reputation (12.5%), Regional research reputation (12.5%), Publications (10%), Books (2.5%), Conferences (2.5%), Normalized Citation impact (10%), Total citations (7.5%), Number of publications that are among the 10% most cited (12.5%), Percentage of total publications that are among the 10% most cited (10%),, International collaboration, relative to country (5%) and Number of highly cited papers that are among the top 1% most cited in their respective field (5%).

Global vs. National rankings

The University of Iowa scored a composite score of 63.8, while Iowa State University scored 59.8.

However, the Global University Ranking is different from the more common National University Ranking for the United States. The University of Iowa ranks 93rd in national universities, and Iowa State comes in at 115th, respectively. The criteria for ranking positions are different globally and nationally.

University of Iowa spokesperson Steve Schmadeke said in an email to the Press-Citizen that the school focuses more on its global position.

"Because the global rankings focus on such a narrow scope (one that does not consider student access, success, or outcomes) and have such opaque criteria, the university does not place a high emphasis on them," Schmadeke said. "In contrast, U.S. News collects all of its own data for the Best Colleges and Best Graduate Schools rankings, which rely heavily on student and school-specific data, such as scores on admissions tests, graduation rates, retention rates, class sizes, and financial resources."

The Global University Report relies heavily on academic reputation surveys taken by Clarivate, a British-American publicly traded analytics company, according to the methodology guide. Other lists are directly sourced by the U.S. News and World Report.

How do the University of Iowa and Iowa State University rank among their peers?

In 2014, the Iowa Board of Regents approved a list of peer institutions for each university to use in their reports. The board updated the list of institutions for the University of Iowa and Iowa State University last year.

In the ranking, the University of Iowa ranked below its 10 peers assigned by The Iowa Board of Regents, while Iowa State University ranked in the middle of its peers, with five schools ranking below ISU.

The only Big Ten university and University of Iowa peer in the top 20 of the global list was the University of Michigan, which is ranked number 19. Six of the University of Iowa's peers were ranked in the top 100, and all 10 peers were ranked in the top 150.

Notable rankings in the University of Iowa's peer group:

19. University of Michigan (83.7)

47. University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (76.7)

61. Ohio State University (74.9)

63. University of Minnesota-Minneapolis (74.7)

74. University of Wisconsin-Madison (73.7)

100. University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign (71.9)

225. University of Iowa (63.8)

Notable rankings in Iowa State's peer group:

123. Michigan State University (69.3)

167. Purdue University (67.0)

262. North Carolina State University (62.0)

278. Virginia Polytechnic & State University (61.3)

311. Colorado State University (60.0)

344. Iowa State University (59.8)

Jessica Rish is an entertainment, dining and business reporter for the Iowa City Press-Citizen. She can be reached atJRish@press-citizen.com or on X, formerly known as Twitter, @rishjessica_