Posts tagged ‘princeton review’

Middlebury Ranked 17th in America by Forbes

On the heels of Princeton Review‘s rankings, Forbes.com has released its “America’s Best Colleges” list.

Middlebury college was named the 17th best college in America and the 15th best private college in America. Of our peer schools, Williams, Swarthmore, Wellesley, Bowdoin, and Amherst placed higher.

Lest you think that these are THE rankings (the U.S. News and Report version), Forbes makes sure to differentiate itself by ranking all college/universities together instead of breaking them into categories as U.S. News does. Last year’s U.S News number five ranking is within the “liberal arts schools” category.

Rankings continue to be a guide for prospective students, despite a recent effort to downplay the reliability and criteria for rankings. We at MiddBlog encourage prospective students to check things out for themselves!

Update: the IvyGateBlog sounds off on the poor performance of Ivy League colleges in the Forbes rankings. They cite the Forbes article, “Small liberal arts schools shine in our rankings, probably due to both the quality of their faculty and the personal attention they can provide. Williams and Swarthmore both rank in the top five, while Pomona, Smith, Middlebury and Amherst all come in the top 20, ahead of such schools as Stanford (23rd) and Brown (27th).”

Princeton Review Rankings 2009

(Update: Here are the 2010 rankings)

It’s that time a year again when colleges are ranked to try and convince stressed-out high school students and their parents that the key to happiness and success is buying a magazine.  The Princeton Review does things a little differently by ranking schools in various categories rather than simply picking a best school overall.  Midd did ok, regaining some positions that we lost last year, and continuing to fall in other categories.  The best sign for me is that our professors are listed as #1 again and we’re back to #8 in “Best Classroom Experience.”  I’m less happy with jumping up two places in “Students Study the Most” and I don’t even want to talk about falling two places in dining hall food.

Here’s what we were awarded this year:

#14 Best Campus Food (#13 last year)

#16 Best Career/Job Placement Services (not listed last year)

#1 Professors Get High Marks (#3 last year)

#4 School Runs Like Butter (#3 last year)

#8 Students Study the Most (#10 last year as “Students Never Stop Studying”)

#8 Best Classroom Experience (#6 last year)

#8 Best Quality of Life (#13 last year)