When I say that I work at a third rate university, to clarify.
A first rate school is known already: the Ivies, UChicago, MIT, Caltech, Duke, some of the small liberal arts colleges. The NYT compiled a list of 170 leading schools (defined as a university or college, in America, that has a five year graduation rate exceeding 75%). A second rate school is at least on that list. The school I work at isn’t.