Rankings and Recognitions

As Michigan State University advances knowledge and transforms lives through innovative academic programs, research, and outreach, the university is recognized internationally as a top research university and a leader in international engagement.

University-wide distinctions

  • The U.S. Department of Energy has selected MSU to design and establish the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams—known as FRIB—a $550 million facility that will advance understanding of rare nuclear isotopes and the evolution of the cosmos as it provides research opportunities for scientists and students from around the globe. A world leader in rare isotope research, Michigan State has been committed to advancing accelerator-based sciences for more than 50 years.
  • MSU has been recognized for seven consecutive years as one of the top 100 universities in the world by Shanghai Jiao Tong University in its Academic Ranking of World Universities. The 2009 rankings also place MSU among the world's top 100 universities for social sciences, life and agricultural sciences, and engineering.
  • For the fifth year in a row, MSU leads the nation in study abroad participation among public universities, according to Open Doors 2009, the Institute of International Education's annual report on international education. Also, in 2008–09, MSU saw a 12 percent increase in international students. With 4,757 international students, MSU ranks sixth in the nation among public universities and 10th among private and public schools.
  • For the 2009–10 academic year, MSU is among the institutions with the highest number of faculty to receive Fulbright U.S. Scholar awards. MSU has seven Fulbright scholars, who are teaching in places such as Malawi, Hungary, and Taiwan. The Fulbright program, established in 1946, is the government’s flagship international exchange program. It is funded jointly by the United States and partnering governments around the world.
  • MSU is one of the nation's top five campuses for sustainability, according to the National Wildlife Federation's Campus Environment 2008 Report Card. The report also indicates that MSU has the greatest number of exemplary programs in sustainability among colleges and universities in Michigan.
  • MSU's residential college, study abroad, service-learning, and undergraduate research programs are listed among U.S. News & World Report's Programs to Look For in the magazine's 2010 edition of America's Best Colleges. The programs are noted as "outstanding examples" of programs linked to student success.
  • U.S. News & World Report's 2010 edition of America's Best Colleges lists MSU among the 100 best national universities in freshman retention rate and most international students.
  • U.S. News & World Report's 2010 edition of America's Best Colleges ranks MSU 29th among the nation's public universities. The publication consistently ranks MSU among the top 100 national universities in its annual rankings.
  • MSU is a member of the prestigious Association of American Universities, a group of only 60 U.S. and two Canadian universities widely regarded as among the top research-intensive institutions in North America.
  • MSU is one of the "top colleges for business," according to Entrepreneur magazine. The October 2009 issue features MSU and East Lansing as one of the 10 leading examples of "universities and cities that are linking up in creative entrepreneurial initiatives." 
  • MSU is the only university in the country with three on-campus medical schools, graduating allopathic (MD) and osteopathic (DO) physicians, as well as veterinarians. As the university extends the College of Human Medicine and the College of Osteopathic Medicine to new areas of the state, it is increasing enrollment, and by 2010, MSU will be among the largest universities in the United States in terms of the number of medical school graduates. 
  • More than 15,200 MSU students were engaged in service-learning activities during the 2008–09 academic year, working with 370 community-service organizations and agencies. Half of them were enrolled in courses that include a service-learning component.
  • MSU continues its outstanding record of students earning prestigious national and international scholarships with the naming of three Goldwater Scholars and one Truman Scholar in 2008–09. The total scholarship count at MSU now stands at: Goldwater, 27; Rhodes, 16; Churchill, 16; Truman, 16; Marshall, 12; Udall, eight; Hollings, four; Gates Cambridge, two; and Mitchell, one. MSU's record of Rhodes Scholars has led the Big Ten for 25 years.
  • MSU ranks third among the nation's largest universities for producing Peace Corps volunteers, according to 2009 Peace Corps rankings. Since the organization was founded in 1961, 2,151 MSU alumni have served in the Peace Corps, making MSU the No. 6 all-time producer of volunteers.  
  • MSU ranks No. 4 on The Scientist magazine's 2008 list of the best places to work in academia in the United States.
  • The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in 2007 selected MSU as one of the first universities to be designated as a "community-engaged university" using its new Community Engagement Classification, which recognizes curricular engagement as well as outreach and partnerships.

The 2010 editions of U.S. News & World Report's America's Best Colleges and America's Best Graduate Schools feature the following program rankings.

  • MSU's Eli Broad College of Business ranks 25th among the nation's undergraduate business programs, and its undergraduate supply chain management/logistics speciality program ranks second in the nation.
  • MSU's graduate programs in elementary and secondary education rank first in the nation for the 15th year in a row. The College of Education ranks 17th in the nation, with five other graduate programs ranking in the top 10 in their categories:
    • Rehabilitation counseling, No. 1
    • Curriculum and instruction, No. 2
    • Higher education administration, No. 4
    • Educational psychology, No. 5
    • Administration and supervision, No. 8
  • MSU's graduate program in industrial/organizational psychology in the College of Social Science ranks first in the nation.
  • MSU's graduate program in nuclear physics in the College of Natural Science ranks second in the nation, behind only the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The university's National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory is the nation's premier rare isotope research facility.
  • MSU's graduate program in supply chain/logistics in the Eli Broad College of Business ranks second in the nation.
  • MSU's graduate program in African history in the College of Social Science ranks third in the nation.
  • Among medical schools, MSU's College of Osteopathic Medicine ranks seventh in the nation in the primary care category, along with four universities, including Harvard. Since 2000, the college has ranked among the top 10 percent of all medical schools nationally and was recognized for its commitment to quality care by the State of Michigan.
  • MSU's College of Human Medicine ranks seventh in the nation in the rural medicine speciality.
  • MSU's graduate program in criminology in the College of Social Science ranks seventh in the nation.
  • MSU's College of Veterinary Medicine ranks ninth in the nation.

Additional top academic programs, centers, and initiatives

  • In 2007, MSU launched the first doctoral program in Chicano/Latino studies in the Midwest and only the second in the nation. The interdisciplinary degree is offered by the College of Social Science.
  • The media and information studies doctoral program in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences was ranked second in the mass communication category by the Chronicle of Higher Education.
  • MSU's Department of Computer Science and Engineering was ranked 18th in the nation among all computer science graduate programs in an article published in the June 2007 issue of Communications of the ACM—the flagship magazine of the Association for Computing Machinery.
  • MSU's student radio station, WDBM-FM, was named the college radio station of the year by the Michigan Association of Broadcasters and Broadcast Music Inc. in 2009 and for the ninth time in the last 10 years.  
  • MSU is one of only four universities across the country asked by the Carnegie Annenberg, Rockefeller, and Ford foundations to take part in the Teachers for a New Era initiative, which is designed to strengthen K–12 teaching by developing state-of-the-art programs in teacher education.
  • MSU will be the home of a new world-class art museum focusing on modern and contemporary art thanks to a gift of $26 million from philanthropist and MSU alumnus Eli Broad and his wife, Edythe. The 41,000-square-foot Broad Art Museum, which will be designed by renowned architect Zaha Hadid of London, will be built on Grand River Avenue near the Collingwood entrance to campus.
  • With accreditation from the Council on Accreditation of Nurse Anesthesia Educational Programs, MSU's nurse anesthesia program in the College of Nursing becomes the fifth such program in the state, enabling the college to help address a shortage in a critical area of health care.
  • MSU leads U.S. universities in the number of African language courses offered and in the number of different African languages taught.
  • MSU offers 26 study abroad programs in Africa, more than any other U.S. university, and more than 1,300 MSU students have studied in Africa since 1992. MSU faculty members work on scores of projects in 32 African nations—more than half the countries on the continent.
  • MSU's Eli Broad Graduate School of Management is the only nonmilitary institution that uses the U.S. Department of Defense's Dynamic Distributed Decision-making Simulation for both teaching and research.
  • The first major university in the United States with a dean of international programs, MSU now has nearly 1,500 faculty members involved in international research, teaching, and service projects and programs in more than 175 countries.
  • Because of the success of MSU's background check system developed for long-term care facilities in Michigan, it is being used as a model for the rest of the country in legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate.
  • MSU and the University of Wisconsin–Madison are partnering in the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center with $125 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, focusing on the conversion of plant biomass to bioenergy.
  • MSU is the leader in a research project funded by a $10 million grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Homeland Security to create the Center for Advancing Microbial Risk Assessment, a consortium of scientists from seven universities with expertise in quantitative microbial risk assessment methods, biosecurity, and infectious disease transmission through environmental exposure.
  • MSU has joined with the University of Notre Dame and the University of Chicago to establish a Physics Frontier Center for Nuclear Astrophysics funded by a five-year, $10 million National Science Foundation grant.
  • MSU's Diagnostic Center for Population and Animal Health is one of the country's premier and busiest veterinary diagnostic laboratories. From just over 9,700 cases when it first opened in 1973, the facility now handles 220,000 cases and more than 1.2 million diagnostic tests per year.
  • As Michigan's land-grant institution, MSU is home to the Michigan Agricultural Experiment Station (MAES), which funds the research of more than 300 scientists in the Colleges of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Natural Science, Engineering, Social Science, and Veterinary Medicine. MAES also includes a network of 14 field research stations across the state.
  • MSU and the 11 other members of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC) are digitizing select collections across all their libraries—up to as many as 10 million volumes—as part of the Google Book Search project. In addition to MSU, CIC members are the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois, Indiana University, the University of Iowa, the University of Michigan, the University of Minnesota, Northwestern University, Ohio State University, Pennsylvania State University, Purdue University, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison.