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Engineering No. 1 among grad schools for fourteenth year in a row

Math, physics, economics, computer science top-ranked by US News & World Report

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- For the 14th consecutive year, MIT's School of Engineering's graduate program is ranked first in the nation by US News & World Report.

According to the rankings, MIT has the No. 1 mathematics graduate program in the country. In physics, MIT shares the top slot with California Institute of Technology. MIT, Carnegie Mellon University, Stanford and University of California-Berkeley tied for first in the computer science rankings.

The 2003 edition of the magazine's newsstand book, "Best Graduate Schools," is now on sale and is available online. Many of the rankings will appear in the April 15 issue of US News & World Report, which will go on sale April 8.

MIT President Charles M. Vest said, "Credit for this remarkable showing goes largely to our faculty, whose teaching and research led to the rankings, and also to our students, who constantly challenge us to be at our best.

"The obvious excellence of our best research universities - the differences among the top few, even in the US News & World Report criteria, are small - reminds us that we must remain vigilant in ensuring the continued well-being of America's research universities."

Although the rankings for business, education, engineering, law and medicine are new, most other categories are not ranked each year. Those that are freshly ranked this year are applied mathematics, biological sciences, chemistry, computer science, mathematics and physics. Others, such as economics, have not been surveyed this year and rankings from previous years are being reprinted.

MIT NO. 1 IN APPLIED MATH

Among newly ranked categories, MIT shares first place in applied mathematics with New York University.

MIT shares second place in the biological sciences with Harvard and University of California-Berkeley. In specialties within that discipline, MIT is seventh in biochemistry, tied with University of California-San Francisco and Yale for third place in cell biology; and third in molecular biology.

In chemistry, MIT is ranked second, tied with California Institute of Technology and Harvard. Among the specialties, MIT's graduate program is first in inorganic chemistry and third in physical chemistry.

In the computer science specialties, MIT is No. 1 in theory and artificial intelligence and shares second place with Carnegie Mellon University in systems.

Among the physics Ph.D. specialties, MIT is first in the atomic/molecular/optical/plasma area; second in condensed matter/low temperature physics and in elementary particle/nuclear physics.

ECONOMICS SPECIALTIES EXCEL

In the School of Humanities, Arts and Social Science (SHASS), the Department of Economics (ranked last year) was placed first, after years of tying for No. 1 with Harvard and Stanford. Harvard, Princeton, Stanford and University of Chicago's economics departments are tied for second place.

In economics specialties, MIT is ranked first in microeconomics and industrial organization graduate programs; second in public finance and third in macroeconomics and international economics.

In other SHASS departments, MIT shares 11th place in political science Ph.D. programs with Columbia University, University of Rochester and University of Madison-Wisconsin. MIT's Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences shares 11th place with psychology graduate programs at Columbia University, Princeton and University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. With Princeton, MIT is ranked ninth in cognitive psychology.

Among the specialty engineering graduate programs ranked best by engineering school deans, MIT was first in the aerospace/aeronautical/astronautical area; second in biomedical/bioengineering; first in chemical engineering; third in civil engineering; first in computer engineering; first in electrical engineering; ninth in environmental engineering; first in materials science, mechanical engineering and nuclear engineering.

As ranked in 1999, MIT is in second place in geology Ph.D. programs. Among the geology specialties, MIT is first in tectonics, second in geophysics, fourth in geochemistry and sixth, with University of Wisconsin-Madison, in sedimentology.

SLOAN MOVES UP TO NO. 4

The Sloan School of Management was ranked fourth nationally in business school rankings, following Stanford, Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. Last year, Sloan was fifth nationally.

Sloan's programs in management information systems, production/operations management and quantitative analysis were ranked No. 1 in the country. Its finance program came in fifth and its entrepreneurship program was No. 6, up from No. 8 last year.

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