UT’s College of Engineering has taken a large leap forward and is now ranked 32nd among all public universities and 57th among all undergraduate programs, according to the U.S. News and World Report’s 2015 rankings released today.
The College of Business Administration’s supply chain management program also continued its upward trajectory, ranking third among public research universities and fourth in the nation. UT’s undergraduate business program ranked 31st among all public universities and 51st among all of America’s business schools.
UT ranked 50th among all public universities, and 106th nationally in the new undergraduate rankings. UT was 47th among public universities and 101st nationally last year. Areas where UT improved in the ranking criteria include the high school counselor peer assessment, average freshman retention rate, graduation rate, and the percentage of freshmen in the top 10 percent of their high school class. UT also was ranked 24th nationally among colleges providing the best support for veterans returning to school.
“We have made great progress in all the ways we measure ourselves,” said Chancellor Jimmy G. Cheek. “We have increased retention rates and graduation rates, and improved research performance and infrastructure. We are serving our students better, and that is the ultimate goal.”
UT tied with six other universities, three of which were slotted in the same position last year: Iowa State University, the University of Kansas, and the University of Oklahoma.
UT’s undergraduate engineering program climbed five slots over last year among public universities and eight slots nationally. Significant factors in the increase include the quality of students and additional research funding.
“We are certainly very pleased to see validation for some of the strides we have made in the College of Engineering,” said college dean Wayne Davis. “We believe that we are on the right path, and this shows that those efforts are paying off for us.”
In 2009, a focus was placed on increasing the number of engineers graduating from UT. In the five years since—and with the help of a $3 million commitment from the state of Tennessee in 2013—the number of graduating engineers has gone from 352 to 487 this past May, an increase of almost 39 percent. At the same time, the quality of students has gone up to the point that this fall’s freshman class in engineering averaged better than a 4.0 high school grade point average and almost a 30 on the ACT.
Today’s new rankings reflect only undergraduate metrics which include graduation and retention rates, peer-school assessments, instructional resources available to faculty, financial resources of the entire university, student selectivity, and alumni giving. The university’s Top 25 goals measure a broader set of data that includes research and graduate education outcomes against a specific set of peer institutions.
For more information on the journey to the Top 25, visit top25.utk.edu.
By: Karen Simsen (865-974-5186, karen.simsen@tennessee.edu)
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