Pritzker School of Medicine continues climb in rankings

Pritzker School of Medicine continues climb in rankings

Two bioscience graduate programs retain top ranking in U.S.

April 23, 2009

The University of Chicago's Pritzker School of Medicine tied for 13th in the latest U.S. News & World Report ranking of the nation's best graduate schools, up from 22nd in 2004. Pritzker is the fastest rising medical school in the top 50 over the last five years.

As a comparatively small institution, the University of Chicago's medical school is at a disadvantage on total research funding from the National Institutes of Health, a key component of the medical school survey. Pritzker regained some of that ground, however, by ranking fourth in the country on research funding per faculty member, with average annual NIH grant support per researcher of $292,300.

Pritzker has also dramatically and steadily increased its ability to attract the best medical students. Since 2004, the medical school's student selectivity has improved from 32nd in the United States to third, behind only Harvard and Washington University.

Two bioscience graduate programs--paleontology and ecology/evolutionary biology--are still ranked the best in the United States. (The bioscience rankings were not updated for this year's magazine.) Graduate programs in the biological sciences overall tied for 18th in the magazine's "Best Graduate Schools" issue, on newsstands April 27, 2009.

No other Illinois program scored as well in either medical education or the biological sciences.