Robert J. Morse, research director for the America's Best Colleges issue of U.S. News and World Report, said the magazine has been considering this change for some time to prevent statistically insignificant differences between schools from affecting the rankings.

Harvard and Princeton each received a composite score of 100. In individual categories, Harvard ranked first among colleges in graduation rate and student selectivity. It was also given a 3.9 out of 4 in academic reputation and ranked second in faculty resources.

Last year, the College slipped in the survey because the magazine was able for the first time to use the percentage of classes' enrolling more than 50 students as a criterion.

Since Harvard's percentage was significantly higher than Yale's or Princeton's, the school's winning streak was doomed. In one year, the percentage of such classes Harvard reported dropped by more than half, from 21 percent to 10 percent.

According to Dean of the college Harry R. Lewis '68, the reason for the drop was a change in the way U.S. News accounted for large courses broken into subsections, such as Spanish A or Math la. Last year they were counted as a single course with more than 50 students, but this year they were reported in accordance to complicated and extensive set of rules.

Lewis said Harvard had a number of conversations with the editors of the survey to ensure that the data Harvard reported was as accurate as possible