If you are considering attending a college or university in the
US, you are probably interested in hearing about some of the
top-rated institutions and the programs they offer. From specific
professional programs to liberal arts degrees, the US has a world
of academic choices for you to discover.
Make sure to explore all your options. It's important to find a
good fit between your academic goals and the organizational culture
of the school of your choice. Think about it: it's a commitment of
several years, so you want to save yourself the trouble of having
to transfer if you decide to switch programs or schools.
For this reason alone, surveys and rankings are a very easy way
to compare your goals with available schools and programs. There
are also organizations dedicated to promoting and monitoring a
consistent level of quality in higher education, though some are
governmental agencies, while others are for profit or businesses
with vested interest in the highly-skilled graduates from these
institutions.
High-Profile Surveys and Organizations
The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of
Teaching is described in the following paragraph from their
official site,
Founded by Andrew Carnegie in 1905 and chartered in
1906 by an act of Congress, The Carnegie Foundation for the
Advancement of Teaching is an independent policy and research
center with a primary mission "to do and perform all things
necessary to encourage, uphold, and dignify the profession of the
teacher and the cause of higher education."
The Carnegie Foundation aims to maintain an objective distance by
overseeing learning and teaching processes in addition to
excellence in curriculum design.
Although there are many surveys available in both academic and
business worlds, the U.S. News & World Report magazine (founded
in 1933) has published an annual survey since 1983, and The
Princeton Review (a for-profit organization started in 1981 by a
Princeton University graduate) is also one of the most visible and
popular sources for this type of information.
The U.S. News & World Report magazine uses a few different
criteria for evaluating school performance, but they also provide
lists for the most popular programs. Their criteria
include:
- National universities
- Liberal Arts colleges
- Universities-Master's
- Baccalaureate colleges
- Specialty schools (Medicine, Engineering, Pharmacy, Law,
etc.)
For further information on the various taxonomies
and methodologies, visit their survey
page.
For a less formal approach and a survey with a definite slant
towards students as consumers, see The Princeton Review's
Best
366 Colleges Survey, with such diverse criteria as
- Academics
- Demographics
- Party
- Schools byType
- Politics
- Quality of Life
- Extra-curricular
- Social
To explore further classifications within the above
categories and the latest results, visit The Princeton Review's
main suvey
page.
You may also be able to register and view more inside information
regarding these surveys for free.
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