UF dropped in two categories in the annual U.S. News and World Report Rankings.
The report, which was released Tuesday morning, indicated that UF fell five spots to No. 58 in the Best National Universities category and two spots to No. 19 in the Best Public Universities category.
Rankings are calculated using a variety of statistics including academic reputation, high school counselor reputation, graduation rate, financial resources data, retention rate and alumni funding.
UF spokesman Steve Orlando said the university's drop in the national and public university categories had to do with change in UF's academic reputation.
"Academic reputation is calculated based on the opinions of other university presidents," Orlando said. "It's a very subjective thing."
In the category of public universities, academic reputation counts 15 percent.
One category in which UF improved was Best Undergraduate Engineering Programs. In that category, UF's College of Engineering moved from No. 32 to No. 27, according to UF spokesman Steve Orlando.
That ties the college with other universities such as Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania and University of Southern California, Orlando said.
Robert Morse, director of data research for U.S. News and World Report, said the report is significant because of its scope.
Compared to other collegiate rankings, Morse said, U.S. News ranks more schools and thus takes more student data into consideration.
Harvard University and Princeton University tied for No. 1 in the national rankings, while University of California, Berkeley was ranked No. 1 in the Public University category.
In the National Universities category, the University of Miami jumped nine spots to No. 38 from last year to this year. It is now the top-ranked university in Florida and 20 spots ahead of UF.
Florida State University ranked No. 101 in the national ranking and No. 46 in the Public School category.
Finance junior Jacob Lauver doesn't think the drop was big enough to really impact the university.
He said he thought UF's falling rankings had to do with acceptance rates.
"We let more people in," Lauver said. "We're more focused on diversity than test scores."
