The University of Florida broke into the nation's top five public universities on Monday, tying for fifth in the 2022 U.S. News and World Report rankings with the University of California-Santa Barbara. UF has advanced nine spots on the public university list since 2017. Florida State University, which in 2019 celebrated a jump to 18th in the annual ranking of public universities, fell one spot to number 19 on the 2022 list. With a rank of 46, the University of South Florida billed itself as “America’s fastest-rising” university. The school has risen 48 spots on the U.S. News chart over the past decade. The University of Central Florida clocked in at 67th among public universities.