In the 2024 edition of U.S. News & World Report’s “Best Colleges” guidebook, Rice University rose four points to No. 12 in environmental engineering and seven points to No. 19 in civil engineering in the best graduate engineering programs categories.
Among private universities, environmental engineering at Rice ranked No. 7 and civil engineering No. 9.
The U.S. News rankings are one of the most closely watched indicators of academic excellence among the nation’s institutions of higher education. U.S. News says its latest rankings are based on 17 measures of academic quality at 1,500 institutions granting bachelor’s degrees across the nation.