Choosing a college or graduate school can seem like the most daunting task of your life. With all the options before you, it’s hard to know for certain which school will be the best choice for your future. But if you’ve chosen to pursue a career in chemistry, you’re a step closer to narrowing down your options.

Below you’ll find a compilation of the highest-ranking chemistry programs in America and their rankings, according to “America’s Best Graduate Schools of 2008” by U.S. News & World Report. These schools were picked from 1,200 colleges across the country based on statistics as well as expert opinion on each program’s academic excellence.

University of California, Berkeley
Top-ranking programs: Chemistry Ph.D., Biochemistry (#1), Organic chemistry (#2), Physical chemistry (#1), Theoretical chemistry (#1)
What sets them apart: Facilities include the nearby Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), which houses state-of-the-art charged particle accelerators and the Advanced Light Source – “one of the world's brightest sources of ultra-violet and soft x-ray beams.”

Contact:

420 Latimer Hall Berkeley, CA 94720-1460 (510) 642-5060 gradadm@berkeley.edu

For more information visit: http://chem.berkeley.edu/grad_info/

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Top-ranking programs: Chemistry Ph.D., Biochemistry (#2), Inorganic chemistry (#1), Physical chemistry (#3), Theoretical chemistry (#3)
What sets them apart: MIT’s Chemistry Department prides itself on the diversity of their student population. As of late, the department has included students from 20 foreign nations. American students hail from more than 104 colleges and universities around the country.

Contact:

77 Massachusetts Ave, Room 2-204 Cambridge, MA 02139-4307 (617) 258-8304 mitgrad@mit.edu

For more information visit: http://web.mit.edu/chemistry/www/index.html

California Institute of Technology
Top-ranking programs: Chemistry Ph.D., Inorganic chemistry (#2), Physical chemistry (#2), Theoretical chemistry (#2)
What sets them apart: Current faculty include three Nobel Prize winners – Rudolph Marcus (1992), Ahmed Zewail (1999), and Robert Grubbs (2005).

Contact:

1200 E. California Boulevard Pasadena, CA 91125 (626) 395-6110

For more information visit: http://chemistry.caltech.edu/

Harvard University
Top-ranking programs: Biochemistry (#3), Organic chemistry (#1)
What sets them apart: The Chemistry Department boasts 278,000 sq. ft. of modern research laboratories spread over four buildings, including their new Naito Laboratory. Harvard University's Libraries are home to over 11.5 million books, 4.9 million titles on microfilm, and 102,000 periodicals. 

Contact:

12 Oxford Street Cambridge, MA 02138 (617) 495-5315 admiss@fas.harvard.edu

For more information visit: http://www.chem.harvard.edu

Stanford University
Top-ranking programs: Chemistry Ph.D., Organic chemistry (#3)
What sets them apart: Stanford’s Chemistry Department is so confident in their selection process, that graduate students don’t have to take any comprehensive examinations to earn a Ph.D. Instead, they monitor progress through individual discussions with a faculty advisor.  

Contact:

333 Campus Drive Mudd Building, Room 121 Stanford, CA 94305-5080 (650) 723-2501 chem.admissions@stanford.edu

For more information visit: http://www.stanford.edu/dept/chemistry/grad/index.html

Northwestern University
Top-ranking programs: Inorganic chemistry (#3), Theoretical chemistry (#3)
What sets them apart: The University has an impressive record of post-graduation results. Of Northwestern’s chemistry majors, about half typically continue their studies in graduate school, 30-40% enter medical school, and roughly 15% become chemists straightaway in industrial or governmental laboratories.

Contact:

2145 Sheridan Road Evanston, IL 60208-3113 (847) 491-5371 info@chem.northwestern.edu

For more information visit: http://www.chem.northwestern.edu/graduate/

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