Neag School Climbs In Grad School Rankings
The Neag School of Education cracked the top 30 in the latest issue of U.S.News & World Report’s rankings of the best graduate schools in America, making it the highest ranked school of education in the northeast.
Four of the school’s programs – administration and supervision, secondary education, special education, and elementary education – were ranked among the top 25 programs in the country, with elementary education climbing in the rankings from 17th in 2004 to 13th.
“We’ve made strategic investments in people and programs,” said Richard Schwab, dean of the Neag school, “and the U.S. News rankings are an indicator that we’re moving closer to achieving our goal of becoming one of the nation’s top 20 schools of education, with signature programs in the top 10.”
While the Neag school received the highest rankings of any UConn program, four other schools were cited by the magazine: the School of Pharmacy was ranked 32nd; the School of Business was ranked 51st in the nation, a jump of 25 spots since 2003; the School of Law was ranked 49th; and the School of Engineering 73rd. Additionally, two programs at the School of Medicine – drug/alcohol abuse, 17th, and primary care, 37th – were included in the rankings.
Other departments whose graduate programs were listed by the magazine as being among the top 50 in the country include audiology, 22nd; the business school’s Department of Information Systems, 27th; speech-language pathology, 28th; and three programs in the School of Engineering: environmental engineering, 38th, materials engineering 45th, and chemical engineering, 48th. The history department was ranked 51st.
Other departments included in the 2005 issue are mechanical engineering, 52; English, 61; electrical engineering, 64; computer engineering, 65; and psychology, 77.
“We’re pleased to see that U.S. News recognizes the quality of several of our programs, especially audiology and speech-language pathology, which were rated in 2004,” said Ross MacKinnon, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
“Audiology has added a new doctorate and new faculty since it was last ranked in 2000, and our speech and hearing clinic is a model for academic programs around the country, and that may be reflected in these top-tier rankings. The magazine hasn’t updated its surveys in many of the science and humanities disciplines in several years, but it was nice to see that our graduate programs in history, English, and psychology are recognized nationally.”
U.S. News does not rank all programs every year. Consequently, some departments and programs that have been ranked in previous years – including the Master of Public Affairs, which was ranked 7th last year – do not appear in this year’s issue.
