UConn Among Top 25 Public Universities

STORRS — UConn is among the top 25 public universities in the nation, jumping three places in the US News & World Report rankings issued this week. For the ninth year in a row, UConn is also the top public university in New England.

UConn is ranked number 24 on the list, tied with Purdue and the University of Iowa. Last year, UConn was ranked 27.

“The US News & World Report rankings, gratifying though they are, really tell an incomplete story,” said UConn President Philip E. Austin. “First, the rankings are based on data more than a year old, and over the past 12 months UConn has continued to advance in every important respect. More fundamentally, however, the rankings only hint at the spirit of enthusiasm and the general sense of quality present on all our campuses. Our faculty, our alumni, our students and their parents know that this is a university that values and achieves excellence in instruction, in research, and in service to the state and national community.”

Some of the particularly notable measures of quality include:

*Increasing demand for admissions, with a 114 percent rise in freshman applications at Storrs since 1995.

*Increasing quality with SAT scores up 79 points to 1,192 since the scores were recentered in 1996.

*Enrollment of 146 valedictorians and salutatorians this fall, a 50 percent increase over last year and up from only 40 in 1995, a 265 percent increase.         

*Increasing admission of students of color. This year’s freshman class includes 20 percent minority students for a total increase since 1995 of 124 percent.

*Retention rates that are substantially higher than most other public colleges and an average graduation rate of 4.3 years, ranked fifth in the nation. 

The University is in the midst of a 20-year infrastructure improvement program called UConn 2000 which represents an unprecedented $2.3 billion investment in the university’s campuses. The university has worked hard to improve its quality and take full advantage of the new facilities, said Mr Austin.