Katherine L. Cohen, CEO and Founder of ApplyWise, claims many students want to attend a campus reminiscent of the settings they’ve read about in J. K. Rowling’s books and seen in the movies made from them.

What that means, exactly, was analyzed by the LA Times Culture Monster arts blog:

The inherent creepiness of Gothic architecture is a given in the “Harry Potter” movies, but there’s also an undercurrent of romanticism at work — a romanticism for higher education and the monastic pursuit of knowledge. The abundance of stained glass and the high, cathedral ceilings give the secular Hogwarts campus a quasi-religious feel.

To help students locate the sought after setting, Cohen and ApplyWise are compiling a list of the colleges and universities likeliest to look and feel like Hogwarts . Number One on the list is the University of Chicago:

The University of Chicago has got Hogwarts written all over it, not least of all in its majestic dining center, Hutchinson Hall, which just so happens to be a replica of Oxford’s Christ Church (the same used in the Harry Potter films). This striking architectural similarity, coupled with the school’s gargoyle gothic facades, is sure to ring any Harry Potter fan’s bell.