Bemidji State Receives Highest U.S. News & World Report College Ranking Since 2010

Bemidji State University has received its highest standing the U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges rankings since 2010.

A press release from the university says the 2026 rankings, released today, show Bemidji State tied for 71st among all public universities in the Midwest region and 23rd among the region’s public institutions. It marks the eighth consecutive year BSU has been ranked as one of the top 30 public universities in the Midwest region, which includes 161 institutions in North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio.

BSU’s 2026 ranking is a 20-spot improvement from last year, when it was tied for 91st. Overall, BSU has been ranked among the top 100 schools in the Midwest by U.S. News since 2019 and has been regionally ranked each year since 2009.

Bemidji State also says it has appeared in three other categories in the Best Colleges 2026 rankings:

• Top performers for social mobility, tied for 150th. Social mobility scores rank schools on two factors related to Pell Grant-eligible students: the percentage of a school’s students who are Pell-eligible, and the percentage of those students who eventually graduate.
• Nursing and psychology programs both ranked 480th nationally. In both categories, scores rely solely on results from peer-assessment surveys. For nursing, BSU met additional requirements to be accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education and to have recently awarded at least 50 bachelor’s degrees in nursing.