Thomas Aquinas College Featured in the 2013 Edition of The Best 377 Colleges

 

Thomas Aquinas College is one of the country’s best institutions for undergraduate education, according to The Princeton Review. The education services company features the 4-year, Catholic college in the 2013 edition of its annual guide, The Best 377 Colleges (free registration required). Only about 15 percent of America’s 2,500 four-year colleges and three colleges outside the U.S.A. are profiled in the publication, The Princeton Review’s flagship college guide.

While these 377 schools are not ranked in any order, they are rated in eight categories on a scale of 60 to 99. Among Thomas Aquinas College’s ratings are perfect scores of 99 for both academics and financial aid, and a score of 97 for quality of life. The guide lists the college as one of only 10 on its Financial Aid Honor Roll and among the 75 private schools featured on its “Best Values” list.

Says Robert Franek, Princeton Review’s Senior VP / Publisher and author of The Best 377 Colleges, “We commend Thomas Aquinas College for its outstanding academics, which is the primary criteria for our selection of schools for the book. Our choices are based on institutional data we collect about schools, our visits to schools over the years, feedback we gather from students attending the schools, and the opinions of our staff and our 30-member National College Counselor Advisory Board.”

“We are delighted that The Princeton Review has once again featured Thomas Aquinas College in its annual guide,” says the College’s president, Dr. Michael F. McLean. “Of particular note are the perfect scores we received for our academic and financial aid programs. Our goal has always been to provide the best education at the most affordable price, and The Princeton Review profile offers some strong evidence of success in these regards.”

In its profile of Thomas Aquinas College, The Princeton Review quotes extensively from students at the College who were surveyed for the book. Among their comments: 1) Thomas Aquinas College is a school that “takes learning seriously for its own sake, not just as preparation for a job;” 2) the College has “a strong Catholic identity” and “a rigorous curriculum,” where “professors … lead you to truth without forcing it on you;” and 3) “You get all kinds of people here — but one thing they have in common is a desire to search for the truth.”

The guide also reports 62 ranking lists of “Top 20” colleges in various categories. The lists are based entirely on The Princeton Review’s survey of 122,000 students (about 324 per campus on average) attending the colleges in the book and not on The Princeton Review’s opinion of the schools. The 80-question survey asks students to rate their own schools on several topics and report on their campus experiences at them. Topics range from assessments of their professors to opinions about their financial aid and campus food. Among the “Top 20” ranking lists on which Thomas Aquinas College appears are the following: “Most Religious Students,” “Happiest Students,” and “Best Classroom Experience.”

 

Posted: August 21, 2012