U.S. News & World Report ranked one graduate program at Portland State University 38th in the nation, and ranked two others in the top 130 in its newest list of best graduate schools, which was released Tuesday.
With its 38th place ranking, PSU’s School of Social Work is in the top 20 percent of social work schools in the country. U.S. News had ranked it every year since 2012, but this is the first year it breached the 20 percent mark.
“As a faster than average growing profession, schools of social work are growing and increasingly competitive,” School of Social Work Dean Laura Nissen said. “Maintaining a top tier ranking is not easy or automatic -- it represents a recognition from peer institutions of our consistent excellence and importance to the profession.”
PSU’s Graduate School of Education was ranked 108th in the nation, and the Civil Engineering department in PSU’s MaseehCollege of Engineering and Computer Science was ranked 121st.
The ranking for the Graduate School of Education is consistent with previous years, according to the school’s dean, Marvin Lynn.
“It is a true testament to the hard work of our outstanding faculty, who are recognized leaders in their disciplines,” he said.
The rankings were based on criteria such as assessments from peers and recruiters, and also took into account the number of Ph.Ds granted, student/faculty ratio, research spending and more.
Last year, U.S. News ranked PSU as one of the top 10 most innovative schools in the United States, and listed Social Work, as well as four other programs – City Management and Urban Policy, Health Care Management, Public Affairs and Rehabilitation Counselling – in its list of top 50 graduate programs.