Fresno State is ranked among the top 20 best universities nationwide for being a driver of social mobility — how well universities provide a college education at an affordable price to create opportunities for students to move from one socioeconomic class to another. The university ranked No. 16 out of 1,205 schools in the 2024 Social Mobility Index published Sept. 23 by CollegeNet, a provider of web-based on-demand technologies for higher education.
Tuition, economic background, graduation rate, early career salary and the size of a school’s endowment are used to determine the rankings. The index also uses ethos, a metric used to measure how a school’s messaging and communications teach faculty, students and the public about the institution’s attention to advancing social mobility.
In September, Fresno State ranked No. 31 for social mobility in U.S. News and World Report’s 2025 Best Colleges rankings and No. 4 in the nation for social mobility in The Wall Street Journal/College Pulse 2024 Best Colleges in the U.S. rankings. In August, the university was No. 22 among the top public and private universities nationally in Washington Monthly’s 2024 annual list of top universities.
