Purdue’s Joey Tanona on Notre Dame return: ‘I couldn’t be more blessed’
The Boilermaker’s starting left tackle, who began his career with the Fighting Irish, plays his first game at Notre Dame Stadium on Saturday.
An Indianapolis university has kept its title for at least two years in a row as one of the top regional Midwest universities, according to the new rankings from U.S. News & World Report.
Butler University was ranked as the No. 1 regional university for the Midwest in the latest ranking lists that rate public and private colleges and universities across the country. Butler also made it to the No. 1 spot for most innovative school among Midwest universities.
Butler University President James Danko said that these rankings are a testament to their faculty and staff providing “an education that is both transformative and impactful.”
“We take pride in cultivating an environment where students thrive academically, personally, and professionally, preparing them for meaningful lives and careers,” Danko said in a news release.
The University of Notre Dame, however, dropped two spots from last year’s list of national overall rankings and is now tied for the 20th spot with three other universities.
The lists have been published for over four decades. This year’s list also includes rankings for the best value schools, most innovative colleges, top performers on social mobility and historically Black colleges and universities.
The methodology for how U.S. News & World Report ranks the colleges has remained mostly unchanged since last year’s list.
The ranking calculation considers up to 17 key measures of academic quality for National Universities and 13 indicators for the National Liberal Arts Colleges, Regional Universities and Regional Colleges.
The most heavily weighted factor in the calculations is student outcomes, at 52%, which takes into account graduation rates, first-year retention, Pell graduation rate, Pell graduation performance, federal loan debt and earnings five years after graduation.
The formula uses data universally reported by schools or obtainable from third-party sources.
2026 top Indiana colleges
- University of Notre Dame
- Purdue University – West Lafayette
- Indiana University – Bloomington
- Indiana University – Indianapolis
- Valparaiso University
- Ball State University
- Marian University
- Oakland City University
- University of Indianapolis
- Indiana State University
2026 Overall Regional Universities (Midwest)
- Butler University – IN
- (tied) John Carroll University – OH
- (tied) Milwaukee School of Engineering – WI
- Calvin University – MI
- Dordt University – IA
2026 Overall National Universities
- Princeton University – NJ
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology – MA
- Harvard University – MA
- (tied) Stanford University – CA
- (tied) Yale University – CT
2026 Overall National Public Universities
- University of California, Berkeley – CA
- University of California, Los Angeles – CA
- University of Michigan, Ann Arbor – MI
- (tied) University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill – NC
- (tied) University of Virginia – VA
All college ranking lists can be found at usnews.com/best-colleges.
Contact IndyStar K-12 education reporter Caroline Beck at 317-618-5807 or CBeck@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter (X): @CarolineB_Indy.