Amherst College and Hampshire College, both in Amherst, have been ranked among the Top 20 Most Politically Active Colleges in the country.

Amherst College placed third while Hampshire was ranked 16th in the ranking by The Princeton Review, the Framingham, Mass.-based standardized test preparation and admissions consulting company.

The nation’s three most politically active colleges are, unsurprisingly, located in the national capital. American, Georgetown and George Washington universities took the top three spots in that order.

The Princeton Review said the rankings were derived from student responses to the question: "How popular are political/activist groups on your campus?" It also published rankings on colleges with the most conservative students and most liberal students.

Some of the things students said about the two Massachusetts universities:

Hampshire University: “Undergrads come to Hampshire College ‘seduced by the prospect of designing [their] own program of study.’ The school offers students ‘a self-designed curriculum’ facilitated by “close relationships with professors, small classes, and the great combination of communal living and individualism that a true Hampshire student embodies.”

Amherst University: “With just more than 1,700 students, Amherst College ‘has a strong sense of community born of its small size’ that goes hand-in-hand with an atmosphere that ‘encourages discussion and cooperation.’”

The following colleges figured in the list of 20 Most Politically Active colleges:

#1. American University, Washington, D.C.
#2. Georgetown University, Washington, D.C.
#3. George Washington University, Washington, D.C.
#4. Amherst College, Amherst, Mass.
#5. New College of Florida, Sarasota, Fla.
#7. Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas
#8. Warren Wilson College, Asheville, N.C.
#9. United States Military Academy, West Point, N.Y.
#10. University of Maryland, College Park, Md.
#14. New York University, New York
#16. Hampshire College, Amherst, Mass.
#17. Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y.