U.S. Academic Quality per Dollar Ranking

These colleges are CollegeCalc's 2020 ranking of the best value colleges in America based on tuition dollar spent. While most of these schools don't have the low published tuition, attractive net prices through generous financial packages combined with academic excellence offer students the highest return on education dollar investment. In order to be considered, schools must possess very high academic standing coupled with costs commensurate to the education provided. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill leads the list with a 95 academic rank and a $10,936 average net price.

Rating is a CollegeCalc proprietary national percentile ranking of a college's overall difficulty and educational effectiveness. An average score is 50. Dollar value is a measure of a school's academic rating compared with the average net price paid. Colleges which are ranked "n/a" didn't report sufficient data to formulate a score. Learn more about our rating methodology.

All price data are reprinted from the U.S. Department of Education's 2018-2019 IPEDS Survey and reflect reported costs for the 2018-2019 academic year.

America's Best Value Colleges by Academic Quality per Dollar

Average Net Price	College	Rating	$Value
$13,081 Average Net Price	21) Purdue University Main Campus Indiana, Public Not-For-Profit	81	83
$16,655 Average Net Price	22) University of California Berkeley California, Public Not-For-Profit	97	82
$16,231 Average Net Price	23) University of California Davis California, Public Not-For-Profit	90	82
$11,573 Average Net Price	24) Indiana University Bloomington Indiana, Public Not-For-Profit	66	82
$15,589 Average Net Price	25) University of Minnesota Twin Cities Minnesota, Public Not-For-Profit	88	82
$15,572 Average Net Price	26) SUNY at Binghamton New York, Public Not-For-Profit	90	82
$12,353 Average Net Price	27) New College of Florida Florida, Public Not-For-Profit	72	82
$16,783 Average Net Price	28) California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo California, Public Not-For-Profit	91	81
$14,759 Average Net Price	29) University of California Santa Cruz California, Public Not-For-Profit	80	81
$14,546 Average Net Price	30) University at Buffalo New York, Public Not-For-Profit	78	81
$16,832 Average Net Price	31) The University of Texas at Austin Texas, Public Not-For-Profit	92	81
$16,131 Average Net Price	32) University of Wisconsin Madison Wisconsin, Public Not-For-Profit	87	81
$17,952 Average Net Price	33) Stanford University California, Private Not-For-Profit	99	81
$19,205 Average Net Price	34) Pomona College California, Private Not-For-Profit	98	80
$19,317 Average Net Price	35) Yale University Connecticut, Private Not-For-Profit	99	80
$16,249 Average Net Price	36) University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign Illinois, Public Not-For-Profit	84	80
$18,477 Average Net Price	37) Colby College Maine, Private Not-For-Profit	97	80
$14,791 Average Net Price	38) Michigan State University Michigan, Public Not-For-Profit	75	80
$18,885 Average Net Price	39) Princeton University New Jersey, Private Not-For-Profit	99	80
$18,671 Average Net Price	40) Reed College Oregon, Private Not-For-Profit	94	80

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