U.S. News & World Report ranked The University of Scranton among the top 10 Best Regional Universities in the North for the 17^th consecutive year. Scranton tied for tenth in its category in the 2011 edition of “Best Colleges,” which also recognized Scranton for its commitment to teaching, graduation rates and value.

For the second year in a row, Scranton was among only 86 schools in the nation recognized for doing “the best job of educating undergrads.” U.S. News began the ranking of colleges expressing a “Strong Commitment to Teaching” just last year. Scranton tied for third and was among the four colleges in its category identified as having faculty with “an unusually strong commitment to undergraduate teaching.” The ranking is based on a peer assessment survey.

As the article accompanying the “Strong Commitment to Teaching” ranking explained, “some schools do a much better job than others of teaching their undergraduate students, putting highly accomplished professors even in front of freshmen and creating a culture that balances the requirements of a faculty members’ academic research with a determination to make the most of students’ time in the classroom.”

For the seventh consecutive year, The University of Scranton was listed in “Great Schools at a Great Price,” which relates academic quality to the cost of attendance. Scranton ranked 13^th among the 15 schools in the North recognized by U.S. News.

In addition, the Jesuit university was included in two non-ranked listings of select schools. Scranton was also among the 21 regional universities listed as having the “Highest Graduation Rates” in the Key Criteria in Judging Schools section. Scranton was among just 39 regional schools in the North listed in “A-Plus Schools for B Students,” which recognizes schools ranked in the top half of their category where scholars “trapped in the GPA of a B student” are thriving.

U.S. News categorizes The University of Scranton among the “Best Regional Universities,” which is based on the official Carnegie classification of universities, and consists of 572 institutions nationwide that offer a full range of undergraduate and master’s level programs, but offer few, if any, doctoral-level programs. The universities in this category are ranked within four geographic regions in the nation. The North region consists of 172 schools in 11 states and Washington, D.C.

U.S. News bases its rankings on a range of quality indicators that include peer assessment (25 percent); graduation and freshman retention (25 percent); faculty resources (20 percent); student selectivity (15 percent); financial resources (10 percent); and alumni giving (5%). Data are gathered from detailed surveys of individual institutions, various government agencies, and surveys of presidents, provosts and deans of admissions at peer universities and colleges.

The 2011 rankings became available at 12:01 a.m. on Aug. 17 on the web, and will be available in print in the “2011 Best Colleges” guidebook after Aug. 24. Highlights of the rankings will be included in the September issue of U.S. News & World Report that publishes on Aug. 31.

In addition to U.S. News, in recent weeks Forbes listed The University of Scranton among “America’s Best Colleges 2010” and The Princeton Review listed Scranton among “The Best 373 Colleges” in the nation.