USA Today‘s annual college rankings, prepared by College Factual, includes Oglethorpe University among its 2017 Best Colleges Nationwide for “Top Quality Overall” and “Best Colleges for the Money”. These rankings compare all four-year institutions, regardless of whether they are designated as liberal arts colleges or research universities, and evaluate quality of education and value, based on total average cost compared to their quality.
Notably, Oglethorpe also scored an “A” in overall diversity, a ranking that measures ethnic, geographic and male-to-female diversity. Within the category of ethnic diversity, Oglethorpe placed in the top 10% of colleges nationwide. According to College Factual, this ranking is a valuable consideration for students evaluating prospective colleges because “being part of a school with a highly diverse student population means exposure to new ideas, cultures and opportunities.”
College Factual also prepares Rankings by Major. These “identify schools that offer a quality education in this major for a price that won’t break the bank,” and evaluate popular majors to determine where colleges may focus their resources and therefore provide “a better education in this area than those that do not.”Oglethorpe came in #1 for Biopsychology and English Language & Literature and was ranked in the top 15% for Accounting, International Relations, Political Science, Writing Studies, Foreign Languages, Romance Languages, and Drama and Theater Arts.
“Many college rankings focus highly on inputs, such as student test scores, and often include subjective elements such as surveys. College Factual rankings are different as they focus highly on outputs, such as graduation rates and student loan default rates,” says College Factual CEO Bill Phelan.
“We also rank colleges on many different aspects of the education they provide, from overall quality, to best value, to best for a specific major. At the end of the day though we want students to go beyond just rankings to discover colleges that are a great match for them all-around.”
