UW-Madison is the top research institution in the nation and twelfth overall, according to the September issue of Washington Monthly Magazine, which released a college guide ranking 245 public and private colleges.
According to Assistant Director of University Communications Brian Mattmiller, the publication took a new approach to ranking colleges and universities based on different values than simply marketing to incoming students.
\What we examined was not how a college or institution serves an individual student but how well it serves the country,"" Washington Monthly editor Ben Wallace-Wells said. ""These are institutions that are enormously well-funded by taxpayers and so what we wanted to do is to say not from a high school junior's perspective but from a taxpayer's perspective which of these universities are doing a good job at serving the needs of the country.""
The hope is to spur colleges to look a little more closely at what taxpayers think is important, and reinforce their commitment to those values, he said.
Washington Monthly based the rankings on institution's performance in three basic areas given equal weight: research, social mobility and community service.
Wisconsin scored particularly well in the criterion of research because it was based on total research funding and doctoral graduates, in which UW placed third and fourth respectively, said Mattmiller.
""It's reassuring because we've always felt to be strong in research you've got to be strong in graduate education and vice versa,"" Dean of Graduate Programs Martin Cadwallader said.
According to him, this recognition also highlights how the university has helped the state economy by creating jobs with technological advances that lead to companies seeking bases in Madison.
""To be the top in research and graduate education means we're bringing in a lot of federal money into the state, and [it's] being spent in the state,"" Cadwallader said.
While Wisconsin excelled in the area of research, the university's ranking in social mobility kept UW-Madison out of the top five overall ranking, said Wallace-Wells.
Washington Monthly evaluated social mobility on the institution's success of taking a poor or working class student and putting them through four years, he said. Wisconsin ranked number 101.
""We feel a big part of a public institution's mission is to serve the economically disadvantaged kids in its state,"" he said. ""Wisconsin falls short of most of its peer group this area.\
