Big-city colleges

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Big-city colleges

Selective colleges set in the heart of a major city — an urban campus woven into the streets, culture, internships, and pace of a metro.

#	College	Location	Accept.	SAT 25–75	Earnings (10 yr)
1	Caltech	Pasadena, CA	3%	—	$128,566
2	Harvard	Cambridge, MA	4%	1510–1580	$101,817
3	Yale	New Haven, CT	4%	1470–1570	$100,533
4	Columbia	New York, NY	4%	1510–1580	$102,491
5	UChicago	Chicago, IL	4%	1510–1580	$91,885
6	MIT	Cambridge, MA	5%	1520–1580	$143,372
7	Princeton	Princeton, NJ	5%	1510–1580	$110,066
8	Northeastern	Boston, MA	5%	1440–1540	$92,538
9	Brown	Providence, RI	5%	1510–1580	$93,487
10	Penn	Philadelphia, PA	5%	1510–1570	$111,371
11	Duke	Durham, NC	6%	1500–1570	$97,800
12	Vanderbilt	Nashville, TN	6%	1500–1570	$91,565
13	Johns Hopkins	Baltimore, MD	6%	1520–1570	$87,555
14	Northwestern	Evanston, IL	8%	1510–1570	$89,363
15	Rice	Houston, TX	8%	1510–1570	$89,718
16	Cornell	Ithaca, NY	9%	1500–1570	$104,043
17	Barnard	New York, NY	9%	1470–1560	$80,516
18	UCLA	Los Angeles, CA	9%	—	$82,511
19	NYU	New York, NY	9%	1480–1560	$82,509
20	USC	Los Angeles, CA	10%	1450–1550	$92,498
21	Stanbridge University	Irvine, CA	10%	—	$62,144
22	Emory	Atlanta, GA	11%	1470–1550	$80,137
23	UC Berkeley	Berkeley, CA	11%	—	$92,446
24	BU	Boston, MA	11%	1420–1530	$83,238
25	Carnegie Mellon	Pittsburgh, PA	12%	1500–1570	$114,862
26	Georgetown	Washington, DC	13%	1390–1550	$103,494
27	Bates	Lewiston, ME	13%	1420–1530	$69,498
28	Tulane	New Orleans, LA	14%	1400–1520	$63,268
29	Georgia Tech	Atlanta, GA	14%	1370–1540	$102,772
30	UNC	Chapel Hill, NC	15%	1390–1530	$72,200
31	Michigan	Ann Arbor, MI	16%	1360–1530	$83,648
32	Boston College	Chestnut Hill, MA	16%	1440–1540	$103,937
33	Wesleyan	Middletown, CT	16%	1415–1540	$73,897
34	Helene Fuld College of Nursing	New York, NY	17%	—	$111,027
35	College of the Holy Cross	Worcester, MA	18%	1240–1410	$90,543
36	Colorado College	Colorado Springs, CO	18%	1230–1460	$65,222
37	Rhode Island School of Design	Providence, RI	19%	1396–1530	$68,140
38	Miami (FL)	Coral Gables, FL	19%	1320–1480	$75,328
39	Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University	Tallahassee, FL	21%	1030–1180	$44,349
40	Wake Forest	Winston-Salem, NC	22%	1410–1520	$78,158
41	Richmond	University of Richmond, VA	22%	1410–1530	$76,178
42	United States Coast Guard Academy	New London, CT	22%	1240–1400	—
43	Citadel Military College of South Carolina	Charleston, SC	23%	1085–1285	$72,085
44	Florida	Gainesville, FL	24%	1320–1480	$71,588
45	Florida State University	Tallahassee, FL	24%	1270–1410	$61,675
46	American Musical and Dramatic Academy	New York, NY	24%	—	$26,975
47	Reed	Portland, OR	25%	1290–1520	$62,927
48	Spelman College	Atlanta, GA	25%	1108–1320	$59,993
49	Trinity University	San Antonio, TX	26%	1340–1500	$71,668
50	Lehigh	Bethlehem, PA	26%	1370–1500	$105,584
51	UT Austin	Austin, TX	27%	1250–1510	$75,121
52	UC San Diego	La Jolla, CA	27%	—	$84,943
53	Franklin and Marshall College	Lancaster, PA	28%	1310–1463	$76,124
54	Macalester	Saint Paul, MN	29%	1350–1510	$63,878
55	UC Irvine	Irvine, CA	29%	—	$80,735
56	Trinity College	Hartford, CT	29%	1298–1470	$90,779
57	University of North Carolina School of the Arts	Winston Salem, NC	30%	1140–1370	$38,357
58	Plaza College	Forest Hills, NY	30%	—	$31,519
59	Southern University and A & M College	Baton Rouge, LA	35%	790–1020	$43,371
60	University of Puerto Rico	Bayamon, PR	35%	—	$34,409

Quick answers

How is a college's campus setting determined?

From the school's IPEDS urban-centric locale (City, Suburb, Town, Rural). We map City → big city, Suburb → suburban, and Town/Rural → college town — the same setting families weigh in the conjoint exercise. It's the physical location, a standardized federal field, not a subjective label.

Does campus setting affect admission odds?

Setting itself doesn't change your odds — it's a fit/preference factor, not an admissions one. But it correlates with size and culture, and it's one of the things QuantAdmit lets you weight so your list reflects the environment you'd actually thrive in.

Setting from IPEDS locale; test scores and earnings from College Scorecard (lag ~2 years). Rankings fill in as more schools are processed. Weight campus setting in your own list with the Best-Fit Simulator.

These outputs are estimates from a baseline model — not guarantees of admission, cost, or outcome.