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Centrepiece Online | Fall 2009
The Rankings Agree: Centre's Stature is Growing
Quality. Personal. International. Affordable.
Again and again, those four words appear in national publications to describe the value of a Centre College education.
And Centre keeps gaining stature in the rankings and college guides.
Take Centre’s prominence in the latest U.S. News & World Report college rankings, for example. Centre maintains its standing as a top-50 national liberal arts college and is Kentucky’s highest ranked college or university by a substantial margin.
Centre also receives special commendations for its strong commitment to teaching, its study abroad program, and its attractive cost (the College provides more than $15 million in financial aid from its own funds each year to keep Centre within reach of every qualified student, regardless of family income).
In U.S. News, Centre is tied for 46th among national liberal arts colleges—considered the country’s strongest and most selective institutions that primarily award bachelor’s degrees. Centre is tied with Dickinson and Skidmore
colleges. The top three, in order, are Williams, Amherst, and Swarthmore.
But Centre really shines in a new category of the U.S. News rankings. Centre is 11th among liberal arts colleges for its faculty’s “unusual commitment to undergraduate teaching,” ranking ahead of such colleges as Amherst, Sewanee, and St. Olaf.
Centre faculty president Dan Stroup says he was “certainly pleased” about the high recognition.
“Our primary commitment is to our students,” he says. “You’ve got to really enjoy teaching.” He adds, “It’s part of the culture. I think the collegiality of the place has a lot to do with keeping the culture alive. There’s a strong sense of community at Centre.”
Stroup, who joined the faculty in 1976, is Lively Professor of Government and Law.
Collegiality is found in faculty lunches that are devoted to discussions of teaching methods and innovations, or when more senior professors serve as mentors to younger ones.
Centre’s commitment to teaching can also be seen in professors readily available in their offices to meet with students, to go over class assignments, or to “just talk.”
The commitment is underscored when Stephanie Fabritius, vice president for academic affairs and dean of the College, reminds professors to stress to prospective faculty that teaching is the top priority.
And the commitment surfaces in day-to-day conversations among faculty who are not only colleagues but friends.
“We talk with each other, and we learn about our teaching,” Stroup says. “This is the way undergraduate education is supposed to be conducted.”
For the first time, U.S. News gives Centre some overdue recognition for its study abroad program by listing the College among 28 schools with the best programs. Centre and Kalamazoo College are tied for the seventh highest percentage of students—85 percent—who study in other countries.
Centre continues to be regarded as an outstanding value, as well. U.S. News put Centre 25th among 40 liberal arts colleges in a “Great Schools, Great Prices” feature. (Williams is first; Centre is the only Kentucky school on the U.S. News best-value list.)
Meanwhile, Centre gets kudos in several other recent magazines and guides.
Forbes, which says it prizes undergraduate education and preparation for the real world, ranked Centre 14th (between Columbia and Haverford) among all colleges and universities.
A CBS MoneyWatch.com rating of the rankings in September awarded highest marks to Forbes. “Despite its limitations, it comes closest to actually measuring the quality of the education at the nation’s best schools,” the report concluded. It also called Centre a “liberal arts jewel.”
Consumers Digest, ranks Centre as the No. 1 value among all private, liberal arts colleges.
The Princeton Review, in its new edition of 371 Best Colleges, applauds Centre’s commitment to “personal education” and “extraordinary success,” and says: “The idea that education is ‘personal’ is at the core of Centre’s ethos.” The guide adds, quoting in part from students: “Centre is chock full of ‘amazing’ professors who ‘really care about you and . . . help you succeed with whatever your final goal is.’”
The Fiske Guide to Colleges, now in its 26th edition, gives Centre 31⁄2 stars (five is tops) for academics; calls the College an “undiscovered gem”; and praises the “unparalleled closeness between students and faculty.” The Fiske Guide also puts Centre on its short lists for outstanding programs in art and drama at small colleges. The guide says that “its liberal arts focus means . . . students are progressive, intellectual, and perhaps more well-rounded than their peers at neighboring schools.” The guide quotes a Centre sophomore: “We have an amazing balance of ‘northern academics’ paired with ‘southern hospitalities.’”
The Insider’s Guide to Colleges, published by the Yale Daily News staff and now in its 36th edition, says: “Centre College provides its 1,215 students with a unique education that includes going to the ballet or to see a musical for credit [and] a guaranteed internship and semester abroad.”
Centre president John Roush says that while the College appreciates the attention it receives in the rankings, one is wise not to take them “all that seriously.”
He notes that “the real story is that Centre College is identified, again and again, as Kentucky’s finest institution
of higher education and as a leader in the country among residential colleges committed to the liberal arts and
sciences.”
Art Jester covered higher education for the Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader for more than 25 years and was on the Centre staff 1986-90. His e-mail address is art.jester@gmail.com.
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Higher Ed Experts Praise Centre“Centre is an outstanding liberal arts college,” says Scott Jaschik, co-editor of InsideHigherEd.com, based in Washington, D.C., and a Cornell University alumnus.
“Centre has a disadvantage in that when people think liberal arts colleges, they think New England, but there really are a lot of really good liberal arts colleges like Centre and others around the country, outside of New England,” he says.
Centre faces tough competition in comparison with the top New England colleges but still has plenty to crow about, he adds.
“I’m sure Centre is better in some departments or programs
or in some students who have special interests,” he says.
Edward B. Fiske, the editor of the Fiske Guide to Colleges, agrees that putting Centre up against the top New England colleges can be challenging.
But the former education editor for the New York Times, who now lives in Durham, N.C., says it’s important to remember that Centre is a standout in its region, worthy of national notice.
“It’s a really high quality college, exceptional in a border state,” says Fiske, who has degrees from Wesleyan University, Princeton Theological Seminary, and Columbia University.
Centre is blessed with a “great tradition” and “its quality speaks for itself,” he says.
