New Rankings Focuses on U.S. Colleges and Universities – NSU Places High on the List

NSU Ranked 7^th in Florida, Top 155 in the U.S.

An inaugural ranking of U.S. colleges and universities is out, and NSU placed very well statewide and nationally.

After reviewing more than 750 colleges and universities across the nation, QS Quacquarelli Symonds has named 300 institutions as the best four-year universities in the United States. NSU placed seventh in Florida and 153^rd in the nation (placing NSU in the top third of ranked universities.)

“Nova Southeastern University has a history of research-based instruction and learning as well as having students graduate and move on to rewarding careers across the state, nation and globe,” said Dr. George Hanbury, NSU President and CEO. “These new rankings recognize these efforts to provide our students with the NSU Edge, and we will continue to offer our students a world-class, hands-on curriculum.”

QS, a global higher education research company and publisher of the QS World University Rankings, released their first annual QS World University Rankings: USA.  These new rankings are designed to assess how well universities are responding to the social, intellectual, and economic challenges of our time. Universities are ranked according to their research performance and career outcomes as well as a range of indicators assessing each institution’s social impact and attempts to foster equitability.

The rankings used indicators that include gender pay gap, faculty gender diversity, ratio of undergraduate students receiving Pell Grants, and retention rate.

QS’ Employer Reputation indicator, a dataset based on the sentiments of over 44,000 hiring managers worldwide, allows potential applicants to assess US universities based on their ability to enhance their future careers, according to the most robust dataset available.

“As the global graduate jobs market becomes even more competitive, our research suggests that students are placing a greater emphasis on this information,” said Ben Sowter, Research Director at QS. “With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic further disrupting the graduate employment market, we predict that concern about the relationship between education and employability will intensify.”

According to QS, these new rankings are unique in that it focuses on diversity & internationalization inputs (the percentage of undergraduates receiving Pell Grant, gender diversity, the percentage of international students) and outputs (e.g. alumni outcomes, graduation rates of Pell Grant recipients, and Fulbright students studying abroad). It is also unique in that particular attention is paid to employability outcomes through a combination of QS proprietary datasets, including alumni outcomes and the QS Employer Reputation survey.

In seeking to provide both domestic and international students with a highly relevant set of criteria for comparison, QS evaluates universities according to four key metric groups, each answering a question of central importance to these audiences:

1. Research: Which universities produce the most impactful and high-quality research in the country?
2. Learning Experience: Which universities do the most to offer a high-quality learning experience to their students
3. Diversity and internationalization: Which universities are most global in their outlook – and which are most diverse, both with reference to the gender breakdown and the socio-economic status of their student and faculty cohorts?
4. Employability: Which universities most nurture graduates and are highly-regarded by employers worldwide, and ensure that their students receive an economic return on their educational investment?