Talent Dividend : Buzz

We thought the drug-and-corruption laden city portrayed in the Wire was the only image New Yorkers had of Baltimore.

But that might change. The New York Times recently published a list of the top cities with the most college graduates and the ranking places Baltimore/Towson No. 13. Our neighbor Washington, D.C., topped the list. San Jose, Calif., Bridgeport, Conn., San Francisco and Madison, Wis., rounded out the top five. 

The Times analyzed data from the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program to come up with the list. It also ran a companion article that says that cities that don't retain college graduates will be left behind. 

"A small number of metro areas vacuum up a large number of college graduates, and the rest struggle to keep those they have," the article states.

Baltimore, can you hear the sucking sound? 

US President Barack Obama? Check. That British crooner who swept the Grammy awards this year. Check.

Not surprising finds on Time's list of the 100 Most Influential People in the World. 

There's one that Baltimoreans can be proud of. Freeman A Hrabowski III, president of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, made the list that even Mark Zuckerberg was left out of. 

"But perhaps the most envied science program in the country is at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County," Time writes. "That's where Freeman A. Hrabowski III, 61, has spent 20 years as president turning a humble commuter school into one of the nation's leading sources of African Americans who get Ph.D.s in science and engineering." 

You can read more about him here.