Boston University, ranked No. 60 last year, moved up three spots to tie for the 57th position, the highest rating for any of the nine America East institutions. Binghamton University (86, tie), University of Vermont (88, tie), and Stony Brook University (98, tie) were others highly rated among the national universities. Vermont jumped up five spots from a year ago, marking the best improvement among the conference's nine universities.

The University of New Hampshire, who was tied for 97th in 2005, just missed out on the top 100 as they were 105th.

U.S. News & World Report defines national universities as those that "offer a wide range of undergraduate majors as well as master's and doctoral degrees. In many cases, they place strong emphasis on research and receive federal money to support their research endeavors."

The survey appears in the August 28 edition of U.S. News & World Report and is based on 15 indicators of academic quality gathered from each institution.

In addition, Binghamton (38), Vermont (39, tie), Stony Brook (46, tie) and New Hampshire (51, tie) ranked among the top public national universities in the country (64 ranked).

A breakdown of the top 100 by conference:
Big 10 - 11
ACC - 11
Big XII - 8
Ivy League - 8
Big East - 8
Pac 10 - 6
SEC - 5
C-USA – 5
America East - 4
Big West - 4
Atlantic 10 - 4
Colonial - 3
Patriot League - 2
West Coast Conference – 2
MEAC - 1
Mid-American - 1
Mountain West - 1
Sun Belt - 1
Atlantic Sun - 0
Big Sky - 0
Big South - 0
Horizon - 0
MAAC - 0
Mid-Continent - 0
Missouri Valley - 0
Northeast - 0
Ohio Valley - 0
Southern - 0
Southland - 0
SWAC - 0
WAC - 0