The Kiplinger 100: Best Values in Private Colleges

Kiplinger’s Personal Finance has named Gonzaga University the 37th best value among private universities nationwide. The annual private school rankings appear in Kiplinger’s February 2009 issue — currently on newsstands — and online.

The Kiplinger 100: Best Values in Private Colleges list ranks the top 50 private universities and the top 50 liberal arts colleges in separate tables (see Page 2). The California Institute of Technology (Caltech) ranks first among private universities, followed by Yale, Princeton, Rice, Duke and Harvard universities to round out the top six schools in Gonzaga’s classification.

In today’s troubled economy, private colleges face shrinking balance sheets and the same out-of-sight costs for utilities, construction, and staff benefits that have contributed to keep tuition increases outpacing inflation for the past decade. The schools with the biggest endowments are among the hardest hit. Schools with both abundant and modest resources are cutting outlays to keep operations running and financial aid flowing.

However, Gonzaga is not cutting expenses and remains committed to maintaining the same high-quality academic programs and generous financial aid it has always offered. Schools with modest endowments — which constitute the vast majority of private colleges and universities — continue to offer a variety of loans, work-study, and grants funded by gifts to help offset tuition costs, which are up 5.6 percent at private colleges and universities nationwide from the 2007-08 academic year, according to the College Board.

Chuck Murphy, Gonzaga's vice president for finance, said the recognition is helpful to the University.

"The current economic environment increases the uncertainties surrounding the decisions by families and students on where to attend college," Murphy said. "This recognition by Kiplinger allows those students and families who may not know a lot about Gonzaga to know that they will be getting a quality education at an affordable price. Our admissions and financial aid professionals stand ready to provide personal assistance to those who want to know how to make a Gonzaga education available to those who desire it."

Kiplinger's Editor Janet Bodnar said families hit by the economic downturn may feel that private institutions are out of their financial reach, but that's far from the truth.

“They will be surprised by our findings. Most of the top-notch schools on the Kiplinger 100 offer generous financial aid packages. And, for those who earn too much to qualify for need-based aid, many of the colleges on our list offer hefty scholarships to a few outstanding students or smaller merit awards to a bigger pool.”

Gonzaga is among those schools with a host of student financial aid opportunities. In fact, 93.4 percent of Gonzaga’s students receive some form of financial aid from the University. This marks the third consecutive year that Gonzaga has been ranked by Kiplinger’s as one of the top 50 best values among private universities nationwide.

Gonzaga’s high academic quality and affordability, admission selectivity, high freshmen retention rate, low student-faculty ratio, and generous financial aid policies all contributed to the University’s ranking. Academic quality accounts for two-thirds of the total in Kiplinger’s methodology.

Kiplinger’s started with data on more than 600 private institutions, then added its own reporting. To determine each category, it used the Carnegie classification system, which organizes institutions based on the highest level and number of degrees offered. Other factors in the best value equation include graduation rate (the percentage of freshmen who earn a bachelor’s degree within four or five years); total cost; cost after need-based aid; aid from grants; costs after non-need-based aid; non-need-based aid; and the average debt upon graduation.

To view the complete article, visit the Kiplinger Web site. Rankings, methodology and other specifics are available at the following link.

For more information about the rankings, please contact Laura Stevens at (202) 862-4372.

Following are The Kiplinger 100 Rankings

Private Universities (1-50)
1. Cal. Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA
2. Yale, New Haven, CT
3. Princeton, Princeton, NJ
4. Rice, Houston, TX
5. Duke, Durham, NC
6. Harvard, Cambridge, MA
7. Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
8. MIT, Cambridge, MA
9. Emory, Atlanta
10. Stanford, Stanford, CA
11. University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
12. Brown, Providence, RI
13. Northwestern, Evanston, IL
14. University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN
15. Vanderbilt, Nashville
16. Brandeis, Waltham, MA
17. University of Richmond, Richmond, VA
18. Johns Hopkins, Baltimore, MD
19. Tufts, Medford, MA
20. Wake Forest, Winston-Salem, NC
21. Georgetown, Washington, D.C.
22. Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA
23. Trinity, San Antonio
24. Cornell, Ithaca, NY
25. Columbia, New York, NY
26. Lehigh, Bethlehem, PA
27. University of Chicago, Chicago
28. Bentley, Waltham, MA
29. Elon University, Elon, NC
30. Univ. of So. California, Los Angeles
31. Providence College, Providence, RI
32. Villanova University, Villanova, PA
33. University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
34. Clark, Worcester, MA
35. Pepperdine, Malibu, CA
36. Case Western Reserve, Cleveland, OH
37. Gonzaga University, Spokane, WA
38. University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL
39. Whitworth, Spokane, WA
40. Baylor, Waco, TX
41. Xavier, Cincinnati
42. Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh
43. Santa Clara Univ., Santa Clara, CA
44. Marquette, Milwaukee
45. New York University, New York City
46. Boston Univ., Boston
47. Loyola College, Baltimore
48. Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY
49. Marist College, Poughkeepsie, NY
50. Emerson College, Boston

Liberal Arts Colleges (1-50)
1. Pomona College, Claremont, CA
2. Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, PA
3. Williams College, Williamstown, MA
4. Davidson College, Davidson, NC
5. Washington & Lee Univ., Lexington, VA
6. Amherst College, Amherst, MA
7. Carleton College, Northfield, MN
8. Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA
9. Haverford College, Haverford, PA
10. Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY
11. Kenyon College, Gambier, OH
12. Claremont McKenna College, Claremont, CA
13. College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA
14. Grinnell College, Grinnell, IA
15. Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL
16. Middlebury College, Middlebury, VT
17. Bowdoin College, Brunswick, ME
18. Lafayette College, Easton, PA
19. Colorado College, Colorado Springs, CO
20. Macalester College, St. Paul, MN
21. Colgate University, Hamilton, NY
22. Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA
23. Bates College, Lewiston, ME
24. Hamilton College, Clinton, NY
25. Barnard College, New York City
26. Colby College, Waterville, ME
27. Whitman College, Walla Walla, WA
28. Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT
29. Centre College, Danville, KY
30. Trinity College, Hartford, CT
31. Denison University, Granville, OH
32. Occidental College, Los Angeles
33. Thomas Aquinas College, Santa Paula, CA
34. Illinois Wesleyan Univ., Bloomington, IL
35. Scripps College, Claremont, CA
36. Oberlin College, Oberlin, OH
37. St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN
38. DePauw University, Greencastle, IN
39. Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, PA
40. Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, MA
41. Muhlenberg College, Allentown, PA
42. Wofford College, Spartanburg, SC
43. Knox College, Galesburg, IL
44. Reed College, Portland, OR
45. Furman University, Greenville, SC
46. Smith College, Northampton, MA
47. Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, PA
48. Kalamazoo College, Kalamazoo, MI
49. Sewanee: Univ. of the South, Sewanee, TN
50. Hillsdale College, Hillsdale, MI