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Category: Institutional Research

UW Recognized in Princeton Review’s Best Value College Rankings

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The Princeton Review released The Best Value Colleges rankings this month and the University of Washington Seattle continues to be recognized as one of the best colleges in the U.S. The Best Value College rankings considered schools with demonstrated excellence in areas such as academics, financial aid, career prospects, and student experience.

In compiling The Best Value Colleges list, The Princeton Review considered more than 40 data points.  The data points include academic outcomes, cost, financial aid, debt, graduation rates, and career and salary outcomes for alumni.  Out of 650 schools considered, 209 schools made the rankings, which the Princeton Review commended as

“…truly the most exceptional in the nation at delivering great academics, affordable cost, and great career foundations.  We strongly recommend and salute the colleges we present here for all they do to help their students with need afford to attend them while delivering an amazing college experience that’s worth every penny.”1

Among public institutions, the University of Washington Seattle was rated #16 on the list of Top 50 Best Value Colleges, up from #18 in 2021.  The Best Value Colleges list considers seven categories in its ranking: overall value, value for students without financial aid, alumni network activity, internship accessibility, career placement, financial aid, and schools making an impact.  Of the seven categories that went into the Best Value Colleges list, the University of Washington Seattle ranked in the top 20 in four categories.

When it comes to value, the University of Washington Seattle was recognized for providing a great return on investment for students.  This year, the UW Seattle placed #11 on the list of Top 20 Best Schools for Internships, highlighting the multitude of career training opportunities students have access to.  Additionally, the UW Seattle placed #16 on the list of Top 20 Best Career Placement in recognition of its career support services and salary outcomes for alumni.

Finally, the University of Washington Seattle was also recognized for engaging students in important work in the community and beyond.  This year the UW Seattle placed #5 on the list of Top 20 Schools for Making an Impact.

 

1 Best Value Colleges Methodology | College Rankings | The Princeton Review

 

UW Ranked #28 in the World for Second Straight Year by Times Higher Education (THE)

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The University of Washington maintains its #28 rank for second year in a row in the Times Higher Education (THE) 2019 World Reputation Rankings, released Wednesday July 17th. This ranking is commonly used to measure a university’s global impact.

The UW is one of only 11 of our US News top public research university peers to make the top 50 in the reputation ranking. In that group of 11, UW is ranked 4th overall, coming in 4th in both research and instruction.

This ranking is based on an opinion survey sent to published scholars around the world. THE asks scholars to name the top 15 universities that come to mind in two categories:  research and teaching. The ranking score is a count of how many times an institution is named by a respondent as being the best in their field.  This year, Harvard University was cited most often, therefore their score was set to 100 and the rest of the universities were graded on a curve as a percentage of Harvard’s 100 score.

The geographic distribution of responses spanned 135 countries, with 20 percent of the responses coming from scholars in North America.  In the survey, scholars are asked their opinions based on their specific discipline.  Scholars with at least 14 years of experience in their field are invited to respond.  This year, THE received 11,554 responses.

Finally, it is worth noting that the survey data used for the Reputation Ranking serves as one of 11 indicators used to create THE World University Rankings that will be published in the fall.

Public Profiles – New Interactive Dashboards Now Available!

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In May 2018, in collaboration with UW-IT’s Enterprise Information, Integration and Analytics (EIIA) unit, the Office of Planning and Budgeting (OPB) relaunched Public Profiles, which are now five interactive dashboards including:

All dashboards, except Degrees Production Trends (which is refreshed every August), are refreshed with new data every academic quarter after census day. The data is sourced from the University of Washington’s Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW). The numbers presented in all dashboards have been approved by OPB and reconcile against internal institutional dashboards – UW Profiles (requires access to EDW).

These dashboards act as the University of Washington’s “Institutional Fact Book.”  Anyone with the access to the internet can view these dashboards using their preferred browser. Explore the dashboards: https://www.washington.edu/opb/uw-data/uw-profiles-information/

Check back for additional dashboards and visualizations as they become available. Updates regarding these dashboards are also provided by UW-IT on their News page.

Please contact uwprofiles@uw.edu with any questions or for help using these dashboards.

New OPB Brief on Activity Based Budgeting (ABB) Trends

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OPB has released a new brief that provides an overview of Activity Based Budgeting (ABB) distribution principles and trends at the UW in Seattle. This brief updates last year’s overview, adding the most recent year’s data. It compares the ABB budgets of Seattle academic units to those of Seattle administrative units over the last seven years (FY12-FY18). The brief also describes a change in the distribution methodology of net tuition operating fee revenue that became effective in FY18.

A few noteworthy trends described in the brief include:

  • Every academic unit’s ABB budget has increased since FY12.
  • Academic units continue to experience more budget growth than administrative units, both in terms of real dollars and in terms of proportionate growth.
  • Of the 34 percent total combined ABB budget growth for Seattle academic and administrative units, 73 percent occurred in academic units, while the remaining 27 percent occurred in administrative units.

The brief also touches on ABB’s future at UW. OPB is working with stakeholders to address emergent issues identified since ABB’s implementation, such as potentially duplicative courses and degrees, the distribution of supplement funds (e.g. permanent base budgets), and summer quarter revenue from programs run by the Continuum College.

Two New Rankings List the UW among Top Universities

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The University of Washington is ranked #25 in this year’s Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings. While other top U.S. universities have slipped in the rankings, the UW maintains its #25 position for the second year in a row. For the first time in the history of the THE rankings, neither of the top two universities are in the U.S.

The THE World University Rankings were first published in 2004. This year’s rankings list 1,000 universities around the world.

Five categories contribute to a university’s ranking score. Of these, teaching (measured by reputation survey, student-faculty ratio, and number of doctoral degrees), research (measured by reputation survey, research income, and publication count), and citations combine to account for 90 percent of the score. The UW scores particularly highly in the citation category, measured as the number of times a university’s researchers are cited by other scholars. The UW’s #17 ranking in citations, with a score of 99.0 out of 100, contributes to its high overall score. In contrast, the UW’s scores in international outlook and industry income—which together account for 10 percent of the overall ranking—are lower in comparison with other top universities.

More information about the Times Higher Ed methodology is available on their website.

The UW is also ranked highly on this year’s U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges list, coming in at #56 among national universities and #18 among public universities. While this represents a slight drop from last year’s #16 ranking among public universities, it continues a long run of being listed among the top 20.

The U.S. News rankings are calculated using seven categories of data: graduation and retention rates; assessment surveys of academic peers and high school guidance counselors; faculty resources; admissions selectivity; per-student spending; performance relative to predicted graduation rate; and alumni donations. Along with the overall university rankings, U.S. News also calculates several more specific lists. The UW ranked highly for undergraduate engineering programs (#11 among doctorate-granting public universities), best colleges for veterans (#11 among public universities), and undergraduate business programs (#14 among public universities).

More information about the U.S. News methodology is available on their website.

The UW’s recognition in these rankings follows the Academic Ranking of World Universities (which ranked the UW #13 in the world) and the Center for World University Rankings (which gave the UW top-10 rankings in 45 subject categories), both published earlier in 2017.

New Ranking Lists the UW among Top Global Universities

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The University of Washington is ranked #13 among world universities on the 2017 Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU). While the UW has consistently ranked among the top 20 universities each year since the ARWU was first published, this year’s ranking is the highest it has achieved to date.

The ARWU was first published in 2003 by Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s Center for World-Class Universities. Since 2009, the ranking has been published by the ShanghaiRanking Consultancy, which is not affiliated with any university. This year, the ARWU ranked 1300 universities around the world, and published the list of the top 500.

Like the recently-published Center for World University Rankings list, the ARWU calculates its rankings based on a university’s external recognition. The components of the ARWU ranking include: total number of alumni and faculty winning major awards; number of highly-cited researchers employed; and counts the number of papers published and cited. The UW scores especially highly in the number of faculty-authored articles indexed in major science and social-science citation indices. In contrast, the number of UW alumni awarded Nobel Prizes or Fields Medals is lower when compared with other top universities. More information about the ARWU’s methodology is available on their website.

In addition to their overall rankings, the ARWU also publishes subject rankings in a number of fields in the natural sciences, engineering, life sciences, medical sciences, and social sciences. The UW’s highest subject rankings in 2017 include: public health (#3 in the world), dentistry and oral sciences (#3), biological sciences (#5), and biomedical engineering (#5).

More information about the UW’s past rankings in the ARWU is available here.

The Princeton Review 2018 Best Colleges

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The Princeton Review has released its Best 382 Colleges, 2018 Edition, with the University of Washington earning a spot among the top 382, including ranking highly on both the Top Schools for Entrepreneurship:  Undergraduate (#11) and The Top 50 Green Colleges (#10). The UW also appears on two unranked lists: Colleges that Pay You Back (one of 209 listed) and the Best Western Colleges (one of 127 listed).

The methodology to produce the Top Green Colleges ratings and rankings includes a combination of school-reported data and student opinion survey questions measuring a school’s performance on environment and sustainability. This year, the UW earned a Green Rating of 99/99 (based on administrators’ responses and data provided) and a Top 50 Green College Ranking of #10 (by student survey responses).

Similarly, the UW’s #11 ranking on the “Top Schools for Entrepreneurship: Undergraduate” list comes from survey responses regarding college entrepreneurship offerings. These surveys include questions on entrepreneurship programs and degrees; student and faculty participation in entrepreneurship; alumni ventures; competitions; and scholarships and aid. Seattle’s Arthur W. Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship, Startup UW (a student club dedicated to entrepreneurship), and CoMotion likely contribute to the high marks in this category.

In addition, the University of Washington was recognized by The Princeton Review on their lists of Best Western Colleges (a regional list of institutions), and Colleges that Pay You Back. Colleges That Pay You Back is a list of the top colleges based on a combination of academic strength, affordability and graduates’ career prospects.

The Princeton Review first published a list of The Top Colleges in 1992. Updated annually, The Princeton Review collects data on more than 2,000 institutions each year for analysis. Approximately 15% of the country’s 2,500 four-year institutions appear on the list. For more information, please visit The Princeton Review Best 382 Colleges.

New Ranking Lists UW Programs in Top 10 Globally

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The Center for World University Rankings has ranked the University of Washington among the top universities in the world. In its inaugural Rankings by Subject, released last week, CWUR ranked the UW in the top 10 worldwide in a total of 45 subject categories. The UW had the ninth-most top-10 appearances of any university, ranking just behind the University of Oxford (47 top-10 appearances) and just ahead of MIT (41).

Unlike most university rankings, CWUR does not make use of data provided by universities themselves. Instead, the CWUR Rankings by Subject are calculated based on the number of research articles published in top-tier journals by an institution’s faculty. CWUR ranked a total of 227 subject areas.

The UW’s top-10 rankings included fields from Acoustics (6th) to Women’s Studies (5th). In all, the UW received top-5 rankings in 22 fields, and its Social Work program was ranked #1 in the world.

More information on CWUR’s methodology is available on their website.

Kiplinger’s 2017 Best College Values Ranking

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On December 15, 2016, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance released its 2017 list of the top 300 “Best College Values.” Kiplinger’s ranks their top 100 public universities based on both in-state and out-of-state cost of attendance. The University of Washington was ranked #12 among public universities in value for in-state students and #24 among public universities in value for out-of-state students. This continues a history of high rankings for the UW. Over the past five years, the UW has ranked #17 or better for in-state state students, and #28 or better for out-of-state students, each year.

The calculations for Kiplinger’s rankings are based on quality criteria (which account for 55 percent of an institution’s overall ranking) and cost criteria (which account for the remaining 45 percent). Quality criteria include:

  • Measures of competitiveness and selectivity (admission rate, percentage of admitted students who choose to enroll, and ACT and SAT scores of incoming freshman);
  • Four-year graduation rate; and
  • Measures of academic support (freshman retention rate and student-to-faculty ratio).

Cost criteria include:

  • Total cost (including tuition and fees as well as books and room and board, with added points for “schools that reduce the price through need-based [grant] aid” or “knock down the price through non-need-based aid”) and
  • Student indebtedness (students’ average debt at graduation and the percentage of students who borrow).

Because public institutions typically have different tuition rates for in-state and out-of-state students, Kiplinger’s provides two separate rankings. While the quality criteria used in both rankings are the same, only in-state students’ cost of attendance factors into the in-state ranking (and likewise for the out-of-state ranking).

As the Kiplinger’s ranking is based on selectiveness, academic outcomes, and cost, it should not be interpreted as either a “best colleges” list or a “most affordable” list. Among the top 10 public institutions for in-state students, for example, some institutions (e.g., College of William and Mary) are highly selective but more expensive, while others (e.g., University of Florida) have more inclusive admissions and lower four-year graduation rates but are more affordable.

For in-state students, the UW compares strongly with the highest-ranked public institutions on measures of affordability. For example, the UW’s cost of attendance for in-state students, after applying need-based aid, is $7,800 per year. The average cost among the top 10 in-state is 50 percent higher, at $11,700. UW students’ average debt at graduation is also lower, by about $2,000, than the average for top-10 institutions. Although the UW’s admit rate is higher and its four-year graduation rate is lower than some other top institutions’, its relative affordability contributes to a strong ranking (#12 in the nation) for in-state students.

The UW’s higher cost for out-of-state students contributes to an out-of-state ranking of #24. For out-of-state students, the UW’s cost of attendance after need-based aid ($31,800) is slightly higher than the average among top-10 institutions ($31,300).

More information about Kiplinger’s methodology is available on their website.

New Peer Tuition Comparisons Now Available

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The Office of Planning & Budgeting has recently published new peer tuition comparisons for the 2016-17 academic year. The new tuition comparisons allow you to see UW tuition rates alongside those of peer institutions.

In the past, OPB has published tuition comparisons for Global Challenge State (GCS) peer institutions. However, more recently OPB has moved away from GCS peer comparisons toward comparisons based on the US News & World Report ranking of Top Public Schools. The 2017 US News ranking is available now (the UW is ranked #16 in the nation). The US News peer comparison group includes all public Research 1 (R1) universities ranked #25 or better; because of ties, and because not all top-25 universities are in the R1 category, there may be more or fewer than 25 institutions in this peer comparison group each year. (In order to make comparisons across time, historical averages are calculated based on the 2017 US News peer list, not the US News list current at the time.)

Comparisons include undergraduate, graduate, MBA, PharmD, law, medicine, and dentistry tuition rates for both resident and nonresident students. Most data are provided through the Association of American Universities Data Exchange (AAUDE). For peer institutions that are not part of AAUDE, we found tuition data on the universities’ websites.

For each tuition category, we provide a list of current tuition rates at each institution, along with a chart comparing UW tuition against the peer group average over the past 5 years. This allows you to look at both the UW’s current rates as well as recent trends, side by side with peers. For example, the UW’s resident undergraduate tuition rate is well below the peer average, partially due to tuition decreases in the last two years. Nonresident undergraduate tuition rates, on the other hand, have tracked closely with the peer average (remaining within 5% of the average over the past five years).

You can see more in the peer tuition comparison file, and find other comparisons on OPB’s Peer Comparisons page. Please contact OPB Institutional Analysis at uwir@uw.edu with any questions.