New Study Gives Rockford Poor Marks For Education

Looking at the results of a recently-published study on the most and least educated cities in the United States reminded me of a couple of quotes. One, from John Belushi in Animal House: "7 years of college down the drain," and the other from my dad: "Did 9 years of high school teach you nothing?"

Personal finance website WalletHub, in their piece "2021’s Most & Least Educated Cities in America" did a comparison study on 150 American cities to figure out where the best and brightest among us decided to put their college degrees to work. Here what they looked for to come up with the numbers:

WalletHub compared the 150 largest metropolitan statistical areas, or MSAs, across 11 key metrics. Our data set ranges from the share of adults aged 25 and older with a bachelor’s degree or higher to the quality of the public-school system to the gender education gap.

Rather than trying to hide the report card on Rockford (like I attempted to do with my own report cards in school), let's just get to it and rip the bandage off really fast.

Out of the 150 cities they looked at, Rockford comes in at #130 with a score of 37.10 out of a possible 100. We were bested by 3 Illinois cities. Chicago (#32), Peoria (#94), and Rock Island (#110).

At least the most-educated American city on WalletHub's list is in the Midwest, as Ann Arbor, Michigan takes the #1 spot. Madison, Wisconsin is #5.

Bringing up the rear, and coming in at number 150 is Visalia, California. The bottom 5 cities are split between two states, California and Texas, with 3 from California and two from Texas.