Apparently we’ve got some high achievers in our town. The Daily Beast just ranked State College the eighth smartest college town in America. How so?

The criteria included bachelor’s degrees per capita, graduate degrees per capita, students’ median SAT scores, and voter turnout in the 2008. While you can’t truly measure the “intelligence” of a town, these criteria make a valiant effort.

We received a “B” overall. Our description:

Known as Happy Valley to locals, State College is seeped in blue and white pride for the Nittany Lions football team. The university is known for its undergraduate engineering and business programs, as well as its top ranking among party schools, according to the Princeton Review. The creative culture is also strong in State College, which prides itself on its burgeoning music scene, annual Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts, and “grilled stickies” sticky buns from The Diner.

I buy it. The top rankings:

1. Chapel Hill, North Carolina
2. Ann Arbor, Michigan
3. Boulder, Colorado
4. Cambridge, Massachusetts
5. Berkeley, California

However, The Daily Beast assigned an “F” to Athens, Georgia. F? Athens conceived Neutral Milk Hotel and Of Montreal! Clearly it’s a city of geniuses, so let’s take these rankings with a grain of salt.

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