In 2022, about 37.7 percent of the U.S. population who were aged 25 and above had graduated from college or another higher education institution, a slight decline from 37.9 the previous year. However, this is a significant increase from 1960, when only 7.7 percent of the U.S. population had graduated from college. Demographics Educational attainment varies by gender, location, race, and age throughout the United States. Asian-American and Pacific Islanders had the highest level of education, on average, while Massachusetts and the District of Colombia are areas home to the highest rates of residents with a bachelor’s degree or higher. However, education levels are correlated with wealth. While public education is free up until the 12th grade, the cost of university is out of reach for many Americans, making social mobility increasingly difficult. Earnings White Americans with a professional degree earned the most money on average, compared to other educational levels and races. However, regardless of educational attainment, males typically earned far more on average compared to females. Despite the decreasing wage gap over the years in the country, it remains an issue to this day. Not only is there a large wage gap between males and females, but there is also a large income gap linked to race as well.

Finding the best public school is a priority for many families. A good education is important to these families, who may even choose where they purchase or rent housing to ensure their children are in the best public school systems.

There are about 51 million public school students in the United States. While far from perfect, public schools play a vital role in their respective communities. Public schools improve their communities and the welfare of children. Public schools welcome all children, no matter their income level, disability, or previous academic performance. Many schools provide school meals, which helps children from food-insecure families get nutritious food every day. The better the public school, the more likely students will achieve higher educational attainment.

While there is no comprehensive way to measure what public schools are the best in the nation, a few surveys look at data, including high school graduation rates and college readiness, to determine which states have the best schools.

States with the Best Public Schools WalletHub ranked each state's public schools for "Quality" and "Safety" using 33 relevant metrics. Metrics included high school graduation rate among low-income students, math and reading scores, median SAT and ACT scores, pupil-teach ratio, the share of armed students, the number of school shootings between 2000 and June 2020, bullying incidence rate, and more. Based on these metrics, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Jersey have the best public schools in the United States.

Finland had the highest quality of primary education in the world in 2017, with an index score of ***. The index runs on a scale of one (low quality) to seven (very good). Switzerland, Singapore, the Netherlands, and Estonia rounded out the top five for countries with the highest quality of primary education. A solid foundation Primary school age children are generally between the ages of six and eleven years old. Primary school is the first stage of formal education and consists of general knowledge and fundamental skills in areas like mathematics, reading, writing, and science, with student enrollment rates being particularly high in advanced economies. This helps young students to form a solid base for further study as they get older. Primary education in the United States Primary schools in the United States, where they are called elementary schools, can be either private or public institutions, with enrollment in public schools generally higher than in private schools. Education from the age of five is mandatory in the U.S., whether that be through the state-funded public school system, private schooling, or through an approved home school program. Depending on state law, students can leave school between the ages of 16 and 18.

This dataset tracks annual overall school rank from 2011 to 2022 for American History High School

Historical Dataset of International School Of America is provided by PublicSchoolReview and contain statistics on metrics:Total Students Trends Over Years (1999-2023),Total Classroom Teachers Trends Over Years (1999-2023),Distribution of Students By Grade Trends,Student-Teacher Ratio Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Asian Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Hispanic Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Black Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),White Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Two or More Races Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (2013-2023),Diversity Score Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Free Lunch Eligibility Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Reduced-Price Lunch Eligibility Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Reading and Language Arts Proficiency Comparison Over Years (2011-2022),Math Proficiency Comparison Over Years (2011-2022),Science Proficiency Comparison Over Years (2021-2022),Overall School Rank Trends Over Years (2011-2022),Graduation Rate Comparison Over Years (2011-2022)

This graph shows the educational attainment of the U.S. population from in 2018, according to ethnicity. Around 56.5 percent of Asians and Pacific Islanders in the U.S. have graduated from college or obtained a higher educational degree in 2018.

In the academic year 2023/24, there were 331,602 international students from India studying in the United States. International students The majority of international students studying in the United States are originally from India and China, totaling 331,602 students and 277,398 students respectively in the 2023/24 school year. In 2022/23, there were 467,027 international graduate students , which accounted for over one third of the international students in the country. Typically, engineering and math & computer science programs were among the most common fields of study for these students. The United States is home to many world-renowned schools, most notably, the Ivy League Colleges which provide education that is sought after by both foreign and local students. International students and college Foreign students in the United States pay some of the highest fees in the United States, with an average of 24,914 U.S. dollars. American students attending a college in New England paid an average of 14,900 U.S. dollars for tuition alone and there were about 79,751 international students in Massachusetts . Among high-income families, U.S. students paid an average of 34,700 U.S. dollars for college, whereas the average for all U.S. families reached only 28,026 U.S. dollars. Typically, 40 percent of families paid for college tuition through parent income and savings, while 29 percent relied on grants and scholarships.

For the academic year of 2024/2025, the University of Oxford was ranked as the best university in the world, with an overall score of 98.5 according the Times Higher Education. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University followed behind. A high number of the leading universities in the world are located in the United States, with the ETH Zürich in Switzerland the highest ranked neither in the United Kingdom nor the U.S.

In 2022, New York spent around ****** U.S. dollars per pupil on public elementary and secondary schools - the most out of any state. The District of Columbia, Vermont, New Jersey, and Massachusetts rounded out the top five states for elementary and secondary school expenditure per pupil.

Out of the OECD countries, Luxembourg was the country that spent the most on educational institutions per full-time student in 2020. On average, 23,000 U.S dollars were spent on primary education, nearly 27,000 U.S dollars on secondary education, and around 53,000 U.S dollars on tertiary education. The United States followed behind, with Norway in third. Meanwhile, the lowest spending was in Mexico.

National Center for Education Statistics. Public Elementary/Secondary School Summary (CCD): School Count - Regular Schools, 2012. Data-Planet™ Statistical Datasets by Conquest Systems, Inc. Dataset-ID: 017-002-002 Dataset: A public elementary/secondary school providing instruction and education services that does not focus primarily on special education, vocational/technical education, or alternative education, or on any of the particular themes associated with magnet/special program emphasis schools. Data are from the Common Core of Data (CCD), a program of the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics that annually collects fiscal and non-fiscal data about all public schools, public school districts and state education agencies in the United States. The data are supplied by state education agency officials. http://nces.ed.gov/ccd/ccddata.asp Category: Education Subject: Secondary Schools, Junior High Schools, High Schools, Public Schools, Elementary Schools Source: National Center for Education Statistics The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is the primary federal entity in the United States for collecting and analyzing data related to education in the US and other nations. NCES is located within the US Department of Education and the Institute of Education Sciences. The NCES fulfills a congressional mandate to collect, collate, analyze, and report complete statistics on the condition of US education; conduct and publish reports; and review and report on education activities internationally. The NCES is one of four centers (along with the National Center for Education Research, the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, and the National Center for Special Education Research) charged with carrying out the work of the Institute of Education Sciences. http://nces.ed.gov/National Center for Education Statistics. Public Elementary/Secondary School Summary (CCD): School Count - Charter School, 2012. Data-Planet™ Statistical Datasets by Conquest Systems, Inc. Dataset-ID: 017-002-020 Dataset: A school providing free public elementary and/or secondary education to eligible students under a specific charter granted by the state legislature or other appropriate authority, and designated by such authority to be a charter school. Data are from the Common Core of Data (CCD), a program of the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics that annually collects fiscal and non-fiscal data about all public schools, public school districts and state education agencies in the United States. The data are supplied by state education agency officials. http://nces.ed.gov/ccd/ccddata.asp Category: Education Subject: Secondary Schools, Junior High Schools, High Schools, Elementary Schools, School Choice, Charter Schools Source: National Center for Education Statistics The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is the primary federal entity in the United States for collecting and analyzing data related to education in the US and other nations. NCES is located within the US Department of Education and the Institute of Education Sciences. The NCES fulfills a congressional mandate to collect, collate, analyze, and report complete statistics on the condition of US education; conduct and publish reports; and review and report on education activities internationally. The NCES is one of four centers (along with the National Center for Education Research, the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, and the National Center for Special Education Research) charged with carrying out the work of the Institute of Education Sciences. http://nces.ed.gov/

The principal purposes of this national longitudinal study of the higher education system in the United States are to describe the characteristics of new college freshmen and to explore the effects of college on students. For each wave of this survey, students complete a questionnaire during freshman orientation or registration containing some 200 items covering information on academic skills and preparation, high school activities and experiences, educational and career plans, majors and careers, student values, financing college, and a variety of demographic questions such as sex, age, parental education and occupation, household income, race, religious preference, and state of birth. Specific questions asked of respondents in the 1968 survey included average grade in secondary school, how many colleges they had applied to for admission, accomplishments during their high school years, highest academic degree they intended to obtain, concerns about financing their education, if they were a twin, source of financing for the first year of school, academic standards and individual ranking at their high schools, size of locality in which they lived when growing up, and what they hoped to accomplish in college. Respondents were also asked to list their probable career occupation, first, second, and least appealing major field of study, and activities they engaged in during their previous year in school. Also elicited were respondents' opinions on the importance of various individuals and events in their decision to enroll in college, assessments of achieving certain goals during their college years, and general attitudes about faculty and other students.

Historical Dataset of American Senior High School is provided by PublicSchoolReview and contain statistics on metrics:Total Students Trends Over Years (1987-2023),Total Classroom Teachers Trends Over Years (1987-2023),Distribution of Students By Grade Trends,Student-Teacher Ratio Comparison Over Years (1987-2023),Asian Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1992-2023),Hispanic Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1991-2023),Black Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1991-2023),White Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (1991-2023),Two or More Races Student Percentage Comparison Over Years (2019-2022),Diversity Score Comparison Over Years (1991-2023),Free Lunch Eligibility Comparison Over Years (1991-2023),Reduced-Price Lunch Eligibility Comparison Over Years (1999-2023),Reading and Language Arts Proficiency Comparison Over Years (2011-2022),Math Proficiency Comparison Over Years (2011-2022),Science Proficiency Comparison Over Years (2021-2022),Overall School Rank Trends Over Years (2011-2022),Graduation Rate Comparison Over Years (2012-2022)

The per capita consumer spending on education ranking is led by Singapore with 1,640.84 U.S. dollars, while Australia is following with 1,290.37 U.S. dollars. In contrast, Ethiopia is at the bottom of the ranking with 0.68 U.S. dollars, showing a difference of 1,640.16 U.S. dollars to Singapore. Consumer spending, in this case education-related spending per capita, refers to the domestic demand of private households and non-profit institutions serving households (NPISHs). Spending by corporations and the state is not included. The forecast has been adjusted for the expected impact of COVID-19.Consumer spending is the biggest component of the gross domestic product as computed on an expenditure basis in the context of national accounts. The other components in this approach are consumption expenditure of the state, gross domestic investment as well as the net exports of goods and services. Consumer spending is broken down according to the United Nations' Classification of Individual Consumption By Purpose (COICOP). The shown data adheres broadly to group tenth As not all countries and regions report data in a harmonized way, all data shown here has been processed by Statista to allow the greatest level of comparability possible. The underlying input data are usually household budget surveys conducted by government agencies that track spending of selected households over a given period.The data is shown in nominal terms which means that monetary data is valued at prices of the respective year and has not been adjusted for inflation. For future years the price level has been projected as well. The data has been converted from local currencies to US$ using the average exchange rate of the respective year. For forecast years, the exchange rate has been projected as well. The timelines therefore incorporate currency effects.

Quality of life is a measure of comfort, health, and happiness by a person or a group of people. Quality of life is determined by both material factors, such as income and housing, and broader considerations like health, education, and freedom. Each year, US & World News releases its “Best States to Live in” report, which ranks states on the quality of life each state provides its residents. In order to determine rankings, U.S. News & World Report considers a wide range of factors, including healthcare, education, economy, infrastructure, opportunity, fiscal stability, crime and corrections, and the natural environment. More information on these categories and what is measured in each can be found below:

Healthcare includes access, quality, and affordability of healthcare, as well as health measurements, such as obesity rates and rates of smoking. Education measures how well public schools perform in terms of testing and graduation rates, as well as tuition costs associated with higher education and college debt load. Economy looks at GDP growth, migration to the state, and new business. Infrastructure includes transportation availability, road quality, communications, and internet access. Opportunity includes poverty rates, cost of living, housing costs and gender and racial equality. Fiscal Stability considers the health of the government's finances, including how well the state balances its budget. Crime and Corrections ranks a state’s public safety and measures prison systems and their populations. Natural Environment looks at the quality of air and water and exposure to pollution.

This dataset tracks annual overall school rank from 2011 to 2022 for U S Grant Elementary School

With an average SAT score of 1545, the California Institute of Technology was the smartest college in the United States in 2020. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvey Mudd College, Washington University in St. Louis, and Harvard University rounded out the top five smartest colleges in the U.S.

Data on the top universities for Business and Economics in 2025, including disciplines such as Accounting and Finance, Business Management, and Economics.

The university in the United States with the largest endowment market value in 2024 was Harvard University, with an endowment fund value of about 51.98 billion U.S. dollars. U.S. higher education Colleges and universities in the United States rank highly among the world’s most prestigious institutions of higher education. Many universities are particularly well known for their strong research capabilities and their connections to many Nobel Prize winning laureates.The U.S. university system is largely decentralized. Except for service academies and staff colleges, the federal government does not directly regulate universities; public universities are administered solely by the individual states. Besides the state administered public universities, there are many private universities in the United States, most are non-profit institutions, similar to the public universities, but there are also a number of institutions that rely on profit (Walden University in Minnesota, for example).In general, tuition fees are required to be paid by students at American universities. Public universities generally charge lower tuition rates to in-state students, than to out-of-state students. Private universities are often much more expensive than public ones because they do not receive funding from state governments.American students are often required to take out student loans to supplement scholarships and grants provided by diverse sources to be able to pay for tuition. Student debt has become a major issue in the United States in recent years, with many Americans unsure if they can even afford to pay off their student loans in the future.

Data on the top universities for Physical Sciences in 2025, including disciplines such as Chemistry, Geology, and Physics & Astronomy.