U.Va. Recognized in Colleges and Universities Rankings

Aug. 16, 2007 -- Two national magazines have recognized the University of Virginia in their rankings of colleges and universities.

U.Va. remains the No. 2 public university in the 2008 edition of the U.S. News & World Report rankings and is tied for No. 23 among all 262 institutions in the magazine’s national university category.

The Darden School of Business at U.Va. is ranked No. 4 in Forbes magazine's biennial ranking of top United States business schools. This represents a jump of four spots for Darden since Forbes’ last ranking in 2005.

Forbes measures what many in the business community believe to be one ofthe most important aspects of graduate business school — return on investment.

“Basically, Forbes examines the salaries a particular class of students earned before they enrolled in their MBA program, then the magazine compares that figure to what the class is earning five years after graduation,” said Ken White, Darden’s vice president for communication and marketing. “In this particular poll, data were used from the Class of 2002.”

Dartmouth, Stanford, and Harvard ranked ahead of Darden on the Forbes list.

In U.S. News rankings, U.Va. has been No. 1 or No. 2 on the list of national public universities in each of the 11 years since the magazine began ranking public universities as a separate category. The University of California - Berkeley continues as the No. 1 public university and is No. 21 overall.

U.Va. is tied with Georgetown University for the 23rd spot among all national universities. A year ago, U.Va. was tied for 24th with the University of Michigan.

U.Va. also ranks 16th among national universities on U.S. News’ Great Schools, Great Prices list. That category is based on a formula that relates a school’s academic quality, as indicated by its U.S. News ranking, to the net cost of attendance for a student who receives the average level of need-based financial aid.

In terms of the individual categories that U.S. News uses to calculate its rankings, U.Va.’s scores showed little change over last year. The peer assessment score, based on a survey of presidents, provosts, and deans of admission, is 4.3 this year, the same as it has been for the past four years. The University's ranking for graduation and retention is No. 13, one spot up from last year; faculty resources is 36th, down a spot from last year; admissions selectivity is No. 26, the same as last year; financial resources is down one place to 57th; and alumni giving is 36th, based on the average percentage of living alumni who gave to their alma maters during 2004-2005 and 2005-2006.

U.Va.’s McIntire School of Commerce is tied for No. 9 on the list of best business schools while the School of Engineering and Applied Science is ranked in a four-way tie at No. 33 in its category for best undergraduate engineering programs at doctoral institutions.

On the list of national universities, Princeton is No. 1 this year followed by Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and a tie between Cal Tech and Penn. After Cal-Berkeley and U.Va., the top public universities are Michigan and UCLA in a tie for third and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill at No. 5. The College of William & Mary ranks sixth and Virginia Tech is 29th among the publics.

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