Georgetown University ranked 12th in The Wall Street Journal’s 2024 “Best Colleges in the U.S.” list published Sept. 6.

Georgetown jumped 20 spots from 32nd place in the 2022 edition. The Wall Street Journal established a new methodology that emphasizes post-graduate outcomes rather than endowment and reputation.

The methodology consists of a 70% weight on student outcomes, a 20% weight on learning environment and a 10% weight on diversity. Georgetown’s score based on the weight given to each category was an 84.6 out of 100.

Georgetown University is proud to be ranked high, a university spokesperson said. 

“While we are proud to be ranked among the top universities in the nation by the Wall Street Journal, we are most focused on the fundamentals of what makes our University strong,” a university spokesperson wrote to The Hoya.

Georgetown scored a 97 on “salary impact vs. similar colleges,” which compares Georgetown graduates’ salary with the salary they were likely to achieve at a similar school, with a $74,097 “value added to graduate salary,” which focuses on the theoretical contribution a Georgetown education makes to students’ future financial successes. 

According to WSJ, it takes Georgetown students on average one year and three months to pay off the average net price of attending the university, $24,570

Georgetown received a recommendation score of 73 based on student survey results, which takes into account categories such as learning opportunities, preparation for career and learning facilities. However, Georgetown only received a score of 56 in the diversity category, which considers metrics regarding the racial, ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds of those on the campus and compares them with results from the student survey. 

Caitlin Keffer (MSB ’26) said she was excited to hear Georgetown was ranked in the top 15 and that the Wall Street Journal’s rankings garnered so much attention. 

“I think it’s where we absolutely deserve to be, and I’m so happy that people are paying attention to the Wall Street Journal over the U.S. News and really highlighting our incredible post-grad outcomes,” Keffer told The Hoya, referring to the U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges Rankings. 

The U.S. News & World Report Rankings, another popular set of college rankings released annually, ranked Georgetown 22nd in its 2022-2023 edition. Last year, Georgetown’s Law Center pulled out of U.S. News’s law school rankings, citing a value difference between the rankings’ focus on salary and Georgetown’s focus on public service. The 2024 edition comes out Sept. 18.

Not all students were satisfied with Georgetown’s improved spot in the WSJ rankings. 

Sophia Sfiroudis (SFS ’26) said she was disappointed at what she viewed was a low place in the rankings for a school of Georgetown’s caliber, given its location and the unrivaled faculty and academic opportunities in the fields of Government and International Affairs.

“Personally, I’m surprised they’re not ranked higher,” Sfiroudis told The Hoya. “I feel like Georgetown has a high rate of graduation; also you’re in D.C. and you have all these jobs here and they have a strong department of Foreign Service that no other school has.”

Will Morris (CAS ’26) said that he does not hold a strong opinion on how the university ranks.

“I think 12 is pretty up there. Personally, I don’t know how other people are but, like, I don’t really care about rankings that much. It doesn’t encapsulate the unique value a student can receive from each college,” Morris told The Hoya.

Morris added that the value of being ranked so highly in a new methodology is rooted in current students’ hopes about their futures.

“That’s just a testament to the type of people this place produces. We have go-getters that go out and do incredible things,” Morris said. 

The administration recommends that, for further information about ways to evaluate universities, students should look into the research produced by Georgetown’s Center on Education and the Workforce.