By Amanda A. Taylor-Uchoa

RIO GRANDE VALLEY, TEXAS – SEPT. 20, 2023 –  Degreechoices.com has ranked UTRGV highly in several categories, including first among Texas public universities for best relative economic value.

Degreechoices.com has also ranked UTRGV 3rd for best colleges in Texas, 3rd in the nation for MSW programs and 5th for bachelor’s programs in criminal justice.

Overall, UTRGV ranks 15th in the nation (7th among national public schools), just behind Rice. UTRGV is ranked above Columbia and Vanderbilt universities for national rankings.

No other Texas school is ranked in the top 25.

The ranking for value is detailed in an article from Forbes listing the top colleges based on relative economic value.

UTRGV President Guy Bailey said rankings like these are valuable because they directly factor in economic value for students and their families.

“To be ranked in the top 15 with schools like MIT, Princeton, Stanford, Harvard and Yale is a tremendous accomplishment and further proof that UTRGV provides one of the best values in the state and country,” Bailey said. “UTRGV continues to provide students the opportunity to pursue their degrees with economic value in mind.”

THE TOP 25

Degreechoices.com ranks hundreds of colleges and universities in various categories, including best national universities, best colleges by region, and best majors and graduate programs. Listed are the top 25 national universities out of a total of 436.

1.       CUNY City College

2.       MIT

3.       Florida

4.       Princeton

5.       Stanford

6.       Harvard

7.       California Tech

8.       Florida International

9.       Penn

10.   Yale

11.   California, Berkeley

12.   Georgia Tech

13.   Michigan

14.   Rice

15.   UTRGV

16.   Vanderbilt

17.   California, Irvine

18.   Washington

19.   UCLA

20.   Columbia

21.   Missouri University of Science and Technology

22.   Illinois

23.   North Carolina

24.   Fresno State

25.   University of California, San Diego

 

ABOUT DEGREECHOICES.COM

Degreechoices.com is an online college guide that bases rankings on relative financial value. These values were based on the economic return students could expect from attending their respective university or college.

According to Forbes, this data is calculated by using public cost and earnings from updated Department of Education’s College Scorecard and the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System ( IPEDS ), with supplemented information from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to allow Degreechoices.com to compute two metrics which, combined, provided an institution’s total economic score.

To calculate an institution’s economic score, the school’s payback is divided by the percentage advantage and disadvantage of the “EarningsPlus” factor. EarningsPlus compares students’ earnings after attending college against a benchmark adjusted by Degreechoices.com based on two variables for salary comparisons.

These variables are each institution’s program ecology to highlight unique academia programs it offers and the in-state/out-state composition of the student body.