UC Merced among top-ranked colleges in U.S. News and World Report. Here’s the data
UC Merced achieved high marks in the latest U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges list, which was released Monday.
UC Merced ranked No. 5 in the Top 5 National Universities for Social Mobility for the 2022-23 school year rankings, the global media company announced Monday.
Plus, UC Merced ranked No. 97 overall among national universities, No. 42 for overall public universities and No. 15 in R2 universities. UC Merced has made the Top 100 list for three consecutive years.
“UC Merced has solidified itself as a world-class institution of higher learning and we take great pride in our ability to maintain that status year after year,” Chancellor Juan Sánchez Muñoz said in a news release.
“This latest ranking is further proof that UC Merced is a viable option for those who crave innovation, seek to push beyond the horizon of knowledge and aspire to be the next generation of leaders.”
Several other Valley schools also performed well:
The California Polytechnic State University was ranked one of the Top 5 Regional Universities in the West among nine other Top 5 rankings.
Fresno Pacific University ranked among Top 5 rankings for social mobility for the the regional universities in the west.
Fresno State ranked among the top 30 in different categories as well.
The U.S. News Best Colleges rankings are meant to be a guide for prospective students and their families.
The social mobility ranking credits schools for enrolling a high percent of Pell Grant students and then graduating them at high rates close to the graduation rate of non-Pell Grant students, the U.S. News methodology explained.
The number of students receiving Pell Grants is an indicator of a school’s economic diversity because it measures how many low-income students attend a school.
Students whose family income is less than $50,000 annually are eligible for federal Pell Grants, but most students receiving the financial aid come from families that make less than $20,000, according to information from U.S. News.
Among the top five national universities for social mobility, the six-year graduation rate among those students was 72%.
“Not only are these schools succeeding at enrolling and graduating low-income students, but they are doing so with larger proportions of low-income students than most of their peers,” U.S. News said about UC, Merced and the other top schools for social mobility.
Founded in 2005, UC, Merced is a rural campus with undergraduate enrollment at 8,276 as of fall 2020.
Eighty-nine percent of undergraduate students get some type of need-based financial aid; the average need-based scholarship or grant was $21,127 in fall 2020 semester.
Its in-state tuition and fees are $13,565, and out-of-state tuition and fees are $43,319, not including $18,887 for room and board.
UC Merced’s fifth place spot comes behind:
Keiser University in FL
University of California, Riverside
California State University – Long Beach
Florida International University
UC, Merced has been ranked No. 4 for social mobility in the past, according to fast facts on their website.
Fresno State ranked No. 30 for social mobility.
Some of Fresno State’s programs also ranked high, including civil engineering at No. 12, electrical engineering at No. 11 and mechanical engineering at No. 18. The programs, all under the Lyles College of Engineering, improved its rankings compared to last year, Fresno State said in a Monday media release.
To rank colleges, U.S. News places each school into a category based on its mission and, sometimes, its geography.
Cal Poly ranks top 5 in 10 divisions
In the West, the California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, known as Cal Poly, is ranked No. 2 for Regional Universities in the West after No. 1 Trinity University in San Antonio.
Cal Poly also ranked in the following categories:
No. 1 for Best Colleges for Veterans
No. 3 for Best Undergraduate Teaching
No. 1 for Most Innovative Schools
No. 1 for Top Public Schools
No. 1 in two engineering department categories of civil and computer engineering and No. 2 in three engineering department categories of aerospace/aeronautical/astronautical, electrical/electronic/communications and mechanical engineering. The engineering department itself is ranked No. 6.
The university was founded in 1901 and had 21,447 students enrolled in undergraduate classes in fall 2020.
The campus is stretched across 6,000 acres in a suburban setting. Its in-state tuition and fees are $8,658; out-of-state tuition and fees are $22,116.
Fresno Pacific University is No. 2 for social mobility among the Regional Universities in the West as well as No. 16 for Best Value Schools. Cal Poly is No. 18 for Best Value Schools.
Over its nearly 40-year span of ranking schools, U.S. News has changed its methodology to “reflect changes in the higher education landscape and the interests of prospective students,” according to a media release. That includes this year’s updates on the way the SAT and ACT are calculated; data around all faculty, even part-time professors, which wasn’t previously included; and college and university classification, like regional or national categories.
U.S. News ranked 1,500 colleges and universities on 17 measures of “academic quality.”
They emphasized factors such as graduation rates, retention rates, graduate debt and social mobility.
Those factors made up 40% of the ranking followed by faculty resources (20%), expert opinion (20%), financial resources (10%), student excellence (7%) and alumni giving (3%).
“A college education is one of the most important – and one of the most costly – investments that prospective students will ever make,” U.S. News says about why it ranks colleges. “For this reason, U.S. News believes students and their families should have as much information as possible about the comparative merits of the educational programs at America’s colleges and universities.”
The Education Lab is a local journalism initiative that highlights education issues critical to the advancement of the San Joaquin Valley. It is funded by donors. Learn about The Bee’s Education Lab at its website.
