LaGrange moves up to third in U.S. News rankings
Aug. 17 , 2007

In its annual evaluation of American colleges and universities,

Featured in the magazine's listing of "Southern Baccalaureate Colleges," LaGrange was rated a top 10 school for the fourth consecutive year, and for the eighth straight year, the College was named a "best value." Last year, LaGrange was rated seventh in its classification.

No Georgia school within the Southern Baccalaureate category ranked higher than LaGrange. Outside the Peach State, only Arkansas's Ouachita Baptist University and South Carolina's Erskine College, finishing one and two respectively, were rated ahead of LaGrange College in a category that covers 12 states.

"For nearly a decade now, the month of August has brought us welcome reports from U.S. News," said LaGrange College President Stuart Gulley, "and this year we received some truly exciting information that has produced a great number of smiles on our campus.

"While these rankings are sometimes both cheered and jeered around the country, with colleges and universities annually debating their meaning, no one can really deny that there is a great deal of attention lavished on schools that crack the top 5—so a number three ranking is a distinction we're happy to embrace."

For its selection of top 10 schools, U.S. News looks at a number of factors, including peer assessment, retention rates, SAT/ACT scores and graduation rates. This year, LaGrange's overall score climbed dramatically, bolstered by an uptick in its peer assessment score. Coming in at a 3.5 on a 5.0 scale, LaGrange College's peer assessment tied with number-one-ranked Ouachita as the best in the category.

"That's a particularly gratifying statistic to me," Dr. Gulley said. "To know that other similar schools think so highly of you is probably the ultimate compliment, and it's a wonderful reflection of the faculty, staff, students and administrative team we have here."

In conferring the "best value" designation, the magazine uses a formula that relates a school's academic quality to its cost of attendance.

Pleased with the news of again achieving "best value," Dr. Gulley said, "When an independent organization announces that you are not only one of the best, but are also one of the best buys, that's something you can truly be proud of because it demonstrates that you're providing a high caliber education that more people will be able to take advantage of."

This year U.S. News changed the name of LaGrange College's category from Southern Comprehensive Colleges to Southern Baccalaureate Colleges. The magazine also reconfigured the category, based on Carnegie Classification, adding some schools and removing others.

A four-year liberal arts and sciences college affiliated with the United Methodist Church, LaGrange College is the oldest private institution of higher learning in Georgia and has an enrollment of more than 1,100 students.

Featured in the magazine's listing of "Southern Baccalaureate Colleges," LaGrange was rated a top 10 school for the fourth consecutive year, and for the eighth straight year, the College was named a "best value." Last year, LaGrange was rated seventh in its classification.