University of Richmond ranked in top tier of "Best Liberal Arts Colleges" by U.S. News & World Report
August 17, 2007
For the third year running, U.S. News & World Report magazine has ranked the University of Richmond in the top tier of "Best Liberal Arts Colleges" in its annual ratings of American colleges and universities, on newsstands Aug. 20.
Richmond tied for 40th place with Franklin and Marshall College, Sewanee-University of the South and Union College. The only other Virginia institution ranked among the top 50 national liberal arts colleges is Washington and Lee University.
U.S. News uses the following factors in developing its rankings: peer assessment, graduation and retention rates, faculty resources, student selectivity, financial resources, alumni giving, and graduation rate performance. The magazine groups colleges and universities into four general categories: best national universities, best national liberal arts colleges, best universities-master's (by region) and best baccalaureate colleges (by region). According to U.S. News, the 266 schools in its national liberal arts category "emphasize undergraduate education and award at least half their degrees in the arts and sciences."
In the past six months, Richmond has been named to a number of prestigious college rankings. Earlier this week, Newsweek featured Richmond on its annual list of the "25 Hottest Schools in America" and named it the hottest college in the country for international studies. Last March, Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine named Richmond to its 2007 list of the 50 "Best Values in Private Universities" and BusinessWeek named the university's Robins School of Business one of the top 25 undergraduate business programs in the country for the second year in a row.