Entries for September 2009

The current recession has meant that more prospective students are looking for ways to make going to college more affordable. Assessing the educational quality of colleges relative to their costs is a difficult task, especially given the complexities of financial aid. With the cost of college increasing faster than most family incomes, value has become a key factor for students in selecting where to go to school.

Which colleges are best buys? Which colleges are the ones where you get the highest quality education for the lowest price? Which top-ranked colleges provide the best need-based financial aid packages in order to make them more affordable? To answer these questions, U.S. News has produced lists of the best college values in 10 academic categories. Because we believe that the best values are found among schools that are above average educationally, only colleges in the top half of their America's Best Colleges 2010 edition rankings category were considered for this evaluation.

Public colleges have seen a huge surge in popularity as a result of the current recession. Many publics have seen big increases in the number of applications as students and their parents are becoming more attracted to the lower sticker prices they find at the public colleges in their own states.

High unemployment, the ever rising cost of private college tuition, and the squeeze on financial aid budgets has meant that more and more students are looking for less expensive options. For many students, public colleges can be a far more affordable choice than a private college, with in-state tuition being the best bargain. Public colleges also can be the low-cost pick for many out-of-state students, because even out-of-state tuitions typically don't approach the prices at private colleges.

U.S. News has once again taken a look at economic diversity at colleges. Economic diversity is important to prospective students who want to know what the composition of the student body actually is on campus. Economic diversity also continues to get a great deal of consideration as a social issue in higher ed. Why? One reason is that many of the top-ranked schools (see links below) historically haven't enrolled large numbers of students from low-income families. It's been argued by many that colleges and universities should make a better effort to educate these students, given education's role in social mobility.

To determine economic diversity, U.S. News looks at the percentage of enrolled undergraduate students receiving Pell grants at each school. Many experts believe that the percentage of students receiving Pell grants is the best available gauge of the proportion of low-income undergrads on a given campus. Pell grants are awarded from a federally funded program that gives need-based grants to low-income students and are most often given to undergrads with family incomes under $20,000.

Behind every great judge is his or her law clerk. Judicial clerkships are considered very prestigious. However, they are very difficult to obtain because they are highly coveted by law school graduates. Federal clerkships are considered the most prestigious, making them that much harder to get.

With this in mind U.S. News has just published our first-ever ranking of which law schools are sending the largest proportions of their graduates on to judicial clerkships for federal judges. The ranking is sorted by the percentage of the 2007 J.D. graduating class that was employed as clerks by federal judges. Yale, not surprisingly, came out No. 1.

Since they give clerks considerable knowledge of the law and court system, clerkships can provide a significant edge in today's very competitive legal job market. In addition, some clerks are more highly prized by potential employers because of the valuable contacts that they develop during their clerkships.