Bluefield College has been ranked among the Top Tier Colleges in the South in U.S. News and World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges: 2018.
Only 59 colleges in the South region made U.S. News’ Top Tier list. Bluefield ranked 41st among the Top Tier schools from 12 Southern states, including Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Arkansas.
“It is an honor to be included as a ‘Top Tier’ college in the South,” said BC president Dr. David Olive. “The college is focused on preparing transformational servant leaders who understand their life calling and seek to impact a changing world. This designation is evidence of our gifted faculty and staff who make up this dynamic Christ-centered learning community.”
Nearly 400 regional colleges in four regions of the United States are evaluated in U.S. News’ annual study, including 79 colleges in the South region. Schools that make the Top Tier list typically score well in student selectivity, financial resources and alumni giving with the greatest emphasis placed on graduation and retention rates, peer assessments, and faculty resources.
“The host of intangibles that make up the college experience cannot be measured by a series of data points,” said Robert J. Morse, chief data strategist for U.S. News, “but for families concerned with finding the best academic value for their money, the U.S. News ‘Best Colleges’ rankings, now in their 33rd year, provide an excellent starting point for the search. They help you compare at a glance the relative quality of institutions based on widely accepted indicators of excellence.”
Schools in the annual U.S. News rankings are categorized by mission, derived from the breakdown of the types of higher education developed by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The categories include National Universities, National Liberal Arts Colleges, Regional Universities, and Regional Colleges with regions divided into North, South, Midwest, and West. Regional colleges, like Bluefield College, focus primarily on undergraduate education.
“Bluefield College is honored to be recognized once again as a Top Tier college in the South by U.S. News,” said Dr. Marshall Flowers, BC’s vice president for academic affairs. “What makes this truly meaningful for the Bluefield community is that performance assessment and peer benchmarking by colleges and universities in the South help determine the rankings annually. Our students experience this level of excellence through an innovative, Christ-centered higher education in the arts, humanities, math, and sciences in more than 40 distinct academic programs.”