The University of Wisconsin has moved up in the new 2024 U.S. News & World Report National University ranking, tying for the 35th place with the University of Illinois–Urbana Champaign. This represents a three-spot jump for UW compared to the 2023 rankings. The university also climbed to 12th among public universities in the latest rankings.

This is the fifth consecutive year UW has moved up the rankings list and is now at its current highest ranking in the last 15 years.

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U.S. News has made considerable changes to its 2024 ranking system. These included removing class size and alumni as criteria and adding a new benchmark which tracks first-generation graduation rates.

But, UW has not reported any sign of class size changing in relation to the university’s rankings.

Kelly Tyrrell, UW’s director of media relations and strategic communications, explained in an email statement to The Badger Herald that it would be difficult to draw a connection between either application size or average applicant qualification and UW’s ranking.

“Our number of applicants has increased annually for many years now, a trend that has remained consistent irrespective of what our particular U.S. News ranking is in a given year,” Tyrrell said.

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Tyrrell also mentioned how UW is grateful for the increased ranking, but does not place too much emphasis on the report.

“As Chancellor Mnookin recently said…rankings are only one thing to consider in choosing a college,” Tyrrell said. “Each student is unique, and there are many tangible and intangible factors that determine which school is the best fit.”

While Chancellor Mnookin says ranking may matter in selecting a college, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona has expressed a clear disapproval of university ranking systems.

“It’s time to stop worshiping at the false altar of U.S. News and World Report,” Cardona said in his speech at the Harvard conference on best practices for law school.

The new rankings report comes after UW Law School opted out of being in this year’s U.S. News & World Report at the beginning of this year. This, to some extent, is part of a larger trend of law and medical schools opting out of rankings. But, UW has yet to indicate any similar process with undergraduate admissions.