U.S. News: UCCS sixth in the West, engineering lauded

Undergraduate engineering at UCCS is among the best in the nation and the quality of all programs make the campus among the best public universities in the Western United States, according to the editors of U.S. News and World Report.

In the 2010 college rankings edition, “America’s Best Colleges,” released Aug. 24, the magazine’s editors ranked the UCCS undergraduate engineering program sixth in the nation among public engineering schools offering bachelor’s and master’s degrees. The magazine’s editors ranked the overall quality of UCCS sixth among public master’s degree-granting Western universities.

For the past several years, UCCS ranked in the top tier of all public and private master’s universities in the West. Master’s universities provide a full range of undergraduate and master’s degree programs.

The undergraduate engineering program at UCCS was ranked in the same category as U.S. military academies with several ties in the rankings. The top engineering programs at public universities offering bachelor’s or master’s degrees were the U.S. Military Academy, the U.S. Naval Academy, California Polytechnic-San Luis Obispo, the U.S. Air Force Academy, California State University Polytechnic-Pomona, Rowan University, the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, San Jose State University, the Citadel, Virginia Military Institute, Miami University, the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and UCCS.

The top public Western universities granting master’s degrees were California Polytechnic-San Luis Obispo, New Mexico Institute of Technology, Western Washington University, California State University-Long Beach, Evergreen State College, California State University-Chico and UCCS.

“I am pleased the efforts of faculty and staff to create a high-quality student experience is recognized,” Chancellor Pam Shockley-Zalabak said. “We are committed to providing affordable, accessible, high-quality educational opportunities that allow southern Colorado to compete nationally and globally.”

In ranking more than 1,400 colleges and universities, U.S. News relies on quantitative measures that education experts have proposed as reliable indicators of academic quality. Among the measures are student retention rates, graduation rates and class size.

A summary of rankings of other CU System campuses is available at https://www.cu.edu/content/usnewsampworldreportrankscuprogramsamongtopnationwideregion
The complete rankings are available at http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges

-- Tom Hutton