The University of Denver is included on Forbes magazine’s 2010 list of America’s Best Colleges. DU ranked 207th out of the 610 schools that were included in the magazine’s third annual college rankings, released last week.
The rankings were prepared by the Center for College Affordability and Productivity (CCAP), in conjunction with Forbes. They were compiled using five general categories:
- Student satisfaction, which was based on student evaluations from RateMyProfessor.com, freshman-to-sophomore retention rates and student evaluations from MyPlan.com.
- Postgraduate success, which was determined by analyzing a listing of salary of alumni from Payscale.com, listings of alumni in Who’s Who in America, and the number of alumni in the Forbes/CCAP corporate officers list.
- Student debt, which was based on the four-year debt load for the typical student borrower and student loan default rates.
- Four-year graduation rate, a score based on the actual four-year graduation rate and the predicted vs. actual four-year graduation rate.
- Competitive awards based on the number of students who win nationally competitive awards.
Only schools categorized by the Carnegie Foundation as doctorate-granting universities, master’s colleges and universities or baccalaureate colleges were included in the rankings.
According to Forbes, “appearing on our list at all is an indication that a school meets a high standard, as the ranking looks at just 9 percent of the 6,600 accredited postsecondary institutions in the U.S.”
DU was ranked between Hampshire College and the University of Mary Washington.
Other Colorado universities appearing on the list included the University of Colorado-Boulder (185), Colorado School of Mines (168), Colorado State University (306) and the University of Colorado-Denver (352).