Association of American Universities

AAU Members: private universities | public universities

The Association of American Universities is a highly selective non-profit organization of 62 leading research universities in the United States and Canada. Membership in the AAU is by invitation only, and all members focus on issues such as research policy, research funding, and both graduate and undergraduate education.

More than half of the doctoral degrees awarded in the United States come from members of the Association of American Universities. While the primary focus of the AAU is graduate study and research, these universities do offer benefits for undergraduates. The perks of a research-centered institution include:

• opportunities to assist graduate students and professors with research (hands-on work is a great resume builder)
• a faculty that is well-connected in the academic and corporate world (this has obvious benefits when looking for jobs and internships)
• strong institutional name recognition in key research areas

Below are the private university members of the AAU in the United States. Click on a name to get the school's description, costs, and admissions data.

• Boston University
• Brandeis University
• Brown University
• California Institute of Technology
• Carnegie Mellon University
• Case Western Reserve University
• Columbia University
• Cornell University
• Duke University
• Emory University
• Harvard University
• The Johns Hopkins University
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• New York University
• Northwestern University
• Princeton University
• Rice University
• Stanford University
• Tulane University
• The University of Chicago
• University of Pennsylvania
• University of Rochester
• University of Southern California
• Vanderbilt University
• Washington University in St. Louis
• Yale University