The Princeton Review's Annual College Rankings Are Out Today on PrincetonReview.com and in The Best 385 Colleges: 2020 Edition, Available August 6th

  • Rankings Name Top 20 Schools in 62 Categories Based on 140,000-Student Survey

NEW YORK, August 5, 2019 — According to a Princeton Review® survey that asked 140,000 students at 385 of the nation's top colleges to rate their schools on dozens of topics important to applicants (and their parents), the college with the most highly rated career center is Clemson University (SC).

Clemson, where more than 80% of students use its Center for Career and Professional Development, ranked #1 on the "Best Career Services" list—one of 62 categories of The Princeton Review's 28th annual college rankings reported today on PrincetonReview.com.    

On the "Great Financial Aid" list, based on students' satisfaction with their aid awards, Bowdoin College (ME) earned the top spot, deservedly. The average grant Bowdoin awarded to its undergrads with need last year was $48,800.

Sarah Lawrence College (NY) finished first on the "Professors Get High Marks" list, which is based on how students rated their professors as teachers. The college stands out for its highly regarded individualized study program and its low student/faculty ratio.

The Princeton Review's ranking lists of the top 20 colleges in these and 59 other categories posted today at www.princetonreview.com/best385 where they can be searched for free with site registration. The lists will also be reported in the new 2020 edition of the education services company's annual "best colleges" guidebook, The Best 385 Colleges (Penguin Random House, $24.99) on sale tomorrow, August 6.

"We chose the 385 colleges for this edition as our 'best' overall, academically, based on data we gathered in 2018–19 from more than a thousand school administrators about their schools' academic programs and offerings," said Robert Franek, The Princeton Review's Editor-in-Chief and lead author of the book. "We are well aware, however, that applicants need more than an academic assessment to choose the colleges best for them. We created our dozens of ranking lists specifically to facilitate that search. We tally our lists using data we gather directly from our surveys of students attending these colleges. Our survey asks the students about their professors, administrators, school services, campus culture, and other facets of life at their schools."

Other Princeton Review ranking list categories and the colleges that earned the #1 spots on them include:

  • "Most Beautiful Campus" — Elon University (NC)
  • "Best Science Labs" — Lehigh University (PA)
  • "Best Health Services" — University of Utah
  • "Best Campus Food" — University of Massachusetts—Amherst
  • "Best Athletic Facilities” — Florida State University
  • "Most Politically Active Students" — Pitzer College (CA)
  • "LGBTQ-Friendly" — Bryn Mawr College (PA)
  • "Lots of Race/Class Interaction" — Rice University (TX)
  • "Party Schools" — Syracuse University (NY)
  • "Stone-Cold Sober Schools" — Brigham Young University (UT)
  • "College City Gets High Marks" — Columbia University (NY)
  • "Their Students Love These Colleges" — Vanderbilt University (TN)  

The Princeton Review's 62 ranking lists are based on its surveys of 140,000 students attending the 385 colleges in the book in 2018–19 and/or the previous two academic years. The company does not rank the 385 schools in the book hierarchically, from 1 to 385.

The survey (www.princetonreview.com/college-rankings/student-survey) asked students 84 questions about their school's academics, administration, campus community, and themselves. The answer format uses a five-point Likert scale to convert qualitative student assessments into quantitative data for school-to-school comparisons. Information on the survey and ranking methodology is at www.princetonreview.com/college-rankings/how-it-works.

The Best 385 Colleges is one of 150 Princeton Review books (www.princetonreview.com/bookstore) published by Penguin Random House. In addition to its college profiles and 62 ranking lists, the book has two bonus lists. One is titled "Great Schools for 20 of the Most Popular Undergraduate Majors.” The other, "The Princeton Review's 200 Best Value Colleges for 2019," names schools the company profiles in its book, The Best Value Colleges: 200 Schools with Exceptional ROI for Your Tuition Investment.

In tandem with the publication of The Best 385 Colleges, The Princeton Review today launched a free nine-video series on YouTube.com titled "College Admission 101.” Created as an inaugural project for YouTube’s new Learning Playlist feature, The Princeton Review videos share the company's expert advice for students and parents on how to find, get into, and pay for their dream colleges. Video segments reveal college admission secrets many students overlook, strategic approaches to financial aid, unconventional ways to save money on college, and more. The videos are available at http://bit.ly/TPR-YT.

Other resources The Princeton Review offers for college applicants include: college admission counseling and application review services (www.princetonreview.com/college-admissions/college-counseling), a free college search tool that helps students build their personal lists of dream, target, and likely schools, and a rich database of information and advice on navigating the admissions process www.princetonreview.com/college-search.    

About The Princeton Review

The Princeton Review is a leading tutoring, test prep, and college admission services company. Every year, it helps millions of college and graduate school-bound students achieve their education and career goals through online and in person courses delivered by a network of more than 4,000 teachers and tutors, online resources, and its more than 150 print and digital books published by Penguin Random House. Its Tutor.com brand is the largest online tutoring service in the U.S. It comprises a community of thousands of tutors who have delivered more than 15 million one-to-one tutoring sessions. The Princeton Review is headquartered in New York, NY. The Princeton Review is not affiliated with Princeton University. For more information, visit PrincetonReview.com. Follow the company on Twitter @ThePrincetonRev and Instagram @theprincetonreview.

SOURCE: The Princeton Review
WEBSITE:  www.princetonreview.com/best385    

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CONTACT: Jeanne Krier, Director of Publicity for The Princeton Review, 212-539-1350, pressoffice@review.com or Suzanne Podhurst, Director of Communications and Social Media, The Princeton Review, suzanne.podhurst@review.com.

NOTE TO EDITORS: Members of the media can access the ranking lists in breakouts by state/city/college/rank, read FAQs about them, and download reporter resources for this project at https://secure.princetonreview.com/media-best-colleges. They can access any area on PrincetonReview.com requiring registration by using this courtesy login which is exclusively for use by media members: enter username media@review.com and password media.

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