Smart and Smarter: America's Brightest Cities
A new ranking identifies the 25 best-educated cities in the U.S.
Feb. 15, 2008— -- Some people are drawn to settling in or traveling to a particular locale because of its eternally warm weather, others find themselves moving around due to family matters or work-related necessities. But what if you're looking to surround yourself with academic excellence in a haven for intellectual stimulation and scholarly achievement? In that case, it's not the sun you're pursuing, but the smarts.
Forbes.com has ranked America's metros and discovered exactly which ones are the union's brightest bulbs. Since our last ranking a year ago, there have been a few upsets in the top 10--although Nos. 1 and 2 have held their positions, some newbies have entered the race and knocked their predecessors out of the competition.
Rather than stopping at 10 this year, we decided to charge it up a bit and expanded the list to include the top 25 brainy locations. To determine their rankings, we used Sperling's BestPlaces and compared the percentages of people ages 25 and up with at least a bachelor's degree.
Click here to learn more about America's smartest cities at our partner site, Forbes.com.
Sperling started with the 379 core statistical divisions the United States Census Bureau defines as metro areas or divisions. The Census Bureau bases the definitions of these areas on commuting and immigration patterns. They do not overlap, and a large city and its suburbs can be divided into two or more such divisions. For example, the Washington, D.C., area includes the city of Washington as well as counties in Maryland and Virginia, but not Montgomery or Frederick counties, Md., which are considered the Bethesda metro division.
We used Sperling's estimate of the populations for each of these metro areas, which started with the Census Bureau's own numbers and other information from Claritas, a market research company.
The cities on our list have populations ranging anywhere from 4 million people down to just 80,000. The common denominator among almost all of them is likely the key to placing rank--they're college towns. Universities are the main factor contributing to a number of the smaller locales appearing on the list--like Ames, Iowa, or Corvallis, Ore., boasting, respectively, 7.23% and 5.62% of residents with Ph.D.s.
Related Stories
ABC News Live