Smart and Smarter: America's Brightest Cities

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.

Professors that live in a school's surrounding area contribute to the increased percentage of informed inhabitants for cities like these. Bert Sperling, founder of BestPlaces, explains that these faculty members, in conjunction with ex-students, are the main forces driving up the percentages.

"There is a natural inclination that comes with it being a college town," says Sperling. "There are the professors that live there and teach there, and then there are the students who stay through inertia and settle down there, have families and start businesses." A high quality of life causes the young and college educated, in their first few years out of school, to flock to these places, as they are the demographic with the most freedom and mobility to move to the places that are the most desirable.

One of these sought-after settings is Boulder, Colo., the city claiming the top spot in our rankings. Boulder is a draw for many reasons, but undeniably because so much of its population is a result of the University of Colorado. But Boulder also has a draw outside the university. As far as environmental awareness goes, Boulder is one of the greenest cities in the United States, and the residents take advantage of the many outdoor recreational activities available to the students, professors and overwhelmingly young adult population.

Ithaca, N.Y., is another contender with a large undergraduate community, as it is the home to Ithaca College in addition to Ivy Leaguer Cornell University. Washington D.C., Cambridge, Mass., and Ann Arbor, Mich., each have made the grade as well with their own cultured collegiate residents.

The metro areas on the list that are not necessarily college towns can usually blame their scholarly insight on the fact that they are some of our country's biggest high-tech centers.

"In cities like San Francisco and Seattle," explains Sperling, "brainy people get hired. These places are just great to live in because they attract the well educated--the people who have the money to pay for high-end real estate." Both cities were proverbial hubs of the dot-com era, and while that has somewhat fizzed, they still represent technological epicenters, often drawing the young, intelligent crowd who have the education and the technical background to work for cutting-edge brands. Companies like Microsoft and Amazon.com have established themselves in Seattle and its surrounding suburbs, no doubt capitalizing on the 7.85% of residents 25 and older with a master's degree.

Although we ranked each metro area's educational achievement based on the percentage of residents with at least a bachelor's degree, we have also included the percentage with a Ph.D., a professional degree (i.e., an advanced degree necessary for doctors, attorneys or architects), and the percentage with a high school diploma. Our findings have given us 25 of America's most knowledgeable--or least best-educated--cities.

We're not saying they're the best, but they're certainly the brightest.