{"id":166786,"date":"2025-10-04T11:15:49","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T11:15:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/big-ten-schools-ranked-academically-by-u-s-news-for-2026-ducks-wire\/"},"modified":"2025-10-04T11:15:49","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T11:15:49","slug":"big-ten-schools-ranked-academically-by-u-s-news-for-2026-ducks-wire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/big-ten-schools-ranked-academically-by-u-s-news-for-2026-ducks-wire\/","title":{"rendered":"Big Ten schools ranked academically by U.S. News for 2026 – Ducks Wire"},"content":{"rendered":"

U.S. News & World Report unveiled its updated\u00a0college and university academic rankings<\/a>\u00a0for 2026 earlier this week, giving us a fresh batch of numbers to look at.
As one of the predominant conferences in all of college athletics, the Big Ten also has some universities ranked among the best academically in the nation.
Within those rankings, where does every Big Ten school stand?
The 18-member conference recently added several<\/span> former Pac-12 members,\u00a0Oregon,\u00a0Washington,\u00a0USC,\u00a0and\u00a0UCLA. Those additions made a significant impact on the conference’s athletic landscape, especially on the football field. So far, the Ducks have been the most impressive of the bunch, ranking No. 2 in the nation through five weeks. However, the academic part should not be discounted; some of those new members instantly joined the conference’s top academic tier, at least according to U.S. News.
As a reminder,\u00a0U.S. News evaluates<\/a>\u00a0schools by their graduation and retention rates, graduate success, academic resources and more. Here is where every Big Ten member stands in the outlet’s updated academic rankings, plus how each ranking compares to\u00a0last year’s hierarchy<\/a>.
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Lincoln, Nebraska
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 158 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>87%
Get more (Nebraska) news, analysis and opinions on\u00a0<\/em>Cornhuskers Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Eugene, Oregon
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 110 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>85%
Get more (Oregon) news, analysis and opinions on\u00a0<\/em>Ducks Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:<\/strong>\u00a0Iowa City, Iowa
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 102 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>84%
Get more (Iowa) news, analysis and opinions on\u00a0<\/em>Hawkeyes Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Bloomington, Indiana
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 73 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>78%
City:\u00a0<\/strong>East Lansing, Michigan
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 64 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>85%
Get more (Michigan State) news, analysis and opinions on\u00a0<\/em>Spartans Wire<\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Minneapolis, Minnesota
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 59 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>80%
City:\u00a0<\/strong>University Park, Pennsylvania
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 59 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>61%
Get more (Penn State) news, analysis and opinions on\u00a0<\/em>Nittany Lions Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>West Lafayette, Indiana
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 46 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>50%
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Seattle, Washington
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 42 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>39%
Get more (Washington) news, analysis and opinions on<\/em>\u00a0Huskies Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>College Park, Maryland
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 42 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>45%
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Piscataway, New Jersey
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 42 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>41%
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Columbus, Ohio
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 41
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>61%
Get more (Ohio State) news, analysis and opinions on\u00a0Buckeyes Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/em>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Champaign, Illinois
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 36 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>42%
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Madison, Wisconsin
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 36 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>45%
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Los Angeles, California
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 28
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>10%
Get more (USC) news, analysis and opinions on<\/em>Trojans Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Ann Arbor, Michigan
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 20 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>16%
Get more (Michigan) news, analysis and opinions on<\/em>Wolverines Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Los Angeles, California
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 17 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>9%
Get more (UCLA) news, analysis and opinions on<\/em>UCLA Wire<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
City:\u00a0<\/strong>Evanston, Illinois
National ranking:\u00a0<\/strong>No. 7 (tied)
Acceptance rate:\u00a0<\/strong>8%
Contact\/Follow\u00a0<\/em>@Ducks_Wire<\/em><\/a> on X (formerly Twitter) and like our page on\u00a0<\/em>Facebook<\/em><\/strong><\/a>\u00a0to follow ongoing coverage of Oregon Ducks news, notes, and opinion<\/em>s.<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

U.S. News & World Report unveiled its updated\u00a0college and university academic rankings\u00a0for 2026 earlier this week, giving us a fresh batch of numbers to look at.As one of the predominant conferences in all of college athletics, the Big Ten also has some universities ranked among the best academically in the nation.Within those rankings, where does […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":166787,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-166786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}