Leading Universities in California

View below for the ratings and ranking profile of some of the leading universities in the U.S. state of California:

California State University - composed of 23 campuses. It is the largest senior system of higher education in the United States.

Azusa Pacific University - designated as one of 123 colleges in the 2010 Best in the West category by The Princeton Review.

Biola University - one of the top 15 California colleges with the highest graduation rates, according to The Sacramento Bee.

University of California, San Diego - ranked the 9th greenest university in the country by the national publication Greenopia.

University of California, Berkeley - No. 1 among all U.S. universities in the number of its research programs considered "distinguished", according to the National Research Council study.

University of California, Davis - 42nd among the top 4000 universities in the world by the Webometrics Ranking of World Universities 2008.

University of California, Irvine - Five research fields are placed in the top five among large research universities according to the 2007 Faculty Scholarly Productivity Index.

University of California, Santa Barbara - 42nd overall among the “Best National Universities” and 11th among the “Top 50 Public National Universities” in the country (USNWR 2010).

California Institute of Technology - Rated the best value of all colleges for the fourth year in a row by Kiplinger's.

University of California, San Francisco - 3rd in the world for Life and Agricultural Sciences and 2nd in the world for Clinical Medicine and Pharmacy (ARWU).

University of California, Los Angeles - 2nd nationally with criteria based on research, community service, and social mobility (The Washington Monthly).

University of California, Riverside - Listed as one of the top 123 Best Western Colleges and one of America's Best Value Colleges by The Princeton Review.

University of California, Santa Cruz - 2nd in the country for academic research impact in the field of space sciences between 1999 and 2003, according to a 2005 report by SCI-BYTES magazine.

Stanford University - The Engineering programs are ranked top among all schools in the annual US News & World Report graduate school rankings.

Alliant International University - Rated Number One in the percentage of international students among national doctoral universities.

Chapman University -  The School of Law is placed among the nation's best law schools in The Princeton Review's Best 174 Law Schools 2009 Edition.

California Baptist University - Placed in the Top 40 nationally among some 116 institutions in the “Best Universities—Master’s West” rankings (USNWR 2010).

Loyola Marymount University - Included in “Best 366 Colleges”, “Best Colleges in the West”, "Happiest Students" and “10 Most Beautiful Campuses”, according to The Princeton Review.

Loma Linda University - Placed 26th overall among the Top 100 colleges offering doctoral degree programs to Hispanics (The Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education).

Dominican University of California - Listed as one of the top universities in the West providing a full range of undergraduate and master’s-level programs.

University of La Verne - Forbes Magazine ranked the University at 206th overall in its recently released “America’s Best Colleges 2009”.

University of San Francisco - The MBA has been rated 6th for business schools with the greatest opportunities for minority students by The Princeton Review.

University of Redlands - Listed as one of the nation's best institutions for undergraduate education in the 2010 edition of "The Best 371 Colleges" guidebook.

University of the Pacific - Listed as one of the 44 "best buys" for a college education in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom by The Fiske Guide to Colleges.

University of San Diego - The undergraduate business program has been placed among the top five schools on the West Coast by BusinessWeek.

University of Southern California - No. 1 in the ranking of top 25 graduate entrepreneurship programs in the nation (The Princeton Review and Entrepreneur magazine).

Santa Clara University - Named one of the nation's best values in private universities, according to Kiplinger's Personal Finance Magazine.

Woodbury University - The Los Angeles Business Journal ranked the Woodbury MBA at 9th place.

Holy Names University - No. 1 in the West in Racial Diversity, according to US News & World Report’s America’s Best Colleges 2008 Edition. It was also named a 2004 "Best Value: A Great School at a Great Price" (USNWR).

Vanguard University of Southern California - Placed in the top five of the best baccalaureate colleges in the West by U.S. News & World Report (2010).

Concordia University, Irvine - Placed in the Tier 1 (#45) in the Universities-Master's (West) category (US News & World Report 2010).

Notre Dame de Namur University - A national report showed that NDNU ranked near the top in six-year graduation rates among small, private universities in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Fresno Pacific University - 45th among the Tier 1 Master's Universities in the west (USNWR 2010).

* Suggested Reading: Top MBA Programs in California