Champlain College Again Featured in the 2018 Princeton Review's "Best 382 Colleges"

Students Cite Upside-Down Curriculum, Internships and Job Opportunities in Recommending Champlain

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BURLINGTON, VT (08/02/2017) Champlain College is one of the nation's best institutions for undergraduate education, according to The Princeton Review. The education services company features the school in the new 2018 edition of its college guide, "The Best 382 Colleges."

Only about 15 percent of America's 2,500 four-year colleges and two colleges outside the U.S. are profiled in the book, which is one of The Princeton Review's most popular guides. Published annually since 1992, it has detailed profiles of the colleges with rating scores in eight categories. The book also has ranking lists of top 20 schools in 62 categories. All of the ranking lists are based on The Princeton Review's surveys of students attending the colleges.

"We chose Champlain College for this book because it offers outstanding academics," said Robert Franek, Princeton Review's Editor-in-Chief and author of "The Best 382 Colleges". "Our selections are primarily based on our surveys of administrators at several hundred four-year colleges. We also visit dozens of colleges each year and give considerable weight to opinions of our staff and our 24-member National College Counselor Advisory Board, Most importantly, we look at valuable feedback we get from each school's customers - our surveys of students attending them. We also keep a wide representation of colleges in the book by region, size, selectivity, and character."

"We are very pleased that The Princeton Review and other publications continue to include Champlain College as one of the top colleges in the nation," noted Lisa Bunders, vice president of Enrollment Management at Champlain College.

In its profile on Champlain College, The Princeton Review praises it for its "career-focused curriculum" and quotes extensively from Champlain students the company surveyed for the book. Among their comments:

  • "Networking and the emphasis on internships at Champlain leads to job placements relevant to your chosen major after (or before!) graduation."
  • "The upside-down curriculum, which uniquely allows undergraduates to take major-specific courses in their first semester: means I could begin major-related work on the first day."
  • "The professors are engaging, encouraging, and interesting and do all they can to help students understand the material and reach their full potential."
  • "Champlain's engaging, encouraging, and interesting" professors know your name and are enthusiastic. They come from extremely professional backgrounds and add personal touches to their discussions that make students want to participate."

The Princeton Review does not rank the colleges from 1 to 382 in any category. Instead, it uses students' ratings of their schools to compile 62 ranking lists of top 20 colleges in the book in various categories. The lists in this edition are entirely based on The Princeton Review's survey of 137,000 students (358 per campus on average) attending the colleges. The 80-question survey asks students to rate their schools on several topics and report on their campus experiences at them. Topics range from their assessments of their professors as teachers to opinions about their school's career services.

"Champlain's core mission is helping students find their academic and career passions and developing them to their highest potential and being included as one of Princeton Review's "Best 382 Colleges" recognizes that ongoing effort. Preparing students for the opportunities and challenges of an increasingly competitive world is not negotiable for us. When a student graduates from Champlain College, they can be confident that they are not only career-ready but also life-ready," Bunders said.

As a whole, the Princeton Review notes Champlain students are "motivated and engaged." They enjoy the social opportunities afforded by Burlington and Champlain, but "are also serious about doing big things and going far in life."

In a "Survey Says" sidebar in the book's profile on Champlain, The Princeton Review lists topics that Champlain students surveyed for the book were in most agreement about in their answers to survey questions. The list includes:

  • Classroom facilities are great
  • Career services are great
  • Internships are widely available
  • Class discussions encouraged
  • Students are environmentally aware
  • Students love Burlington, VT

The schools in "The Best 382 Colleges" also have rating scores in eight categories. The Princeton Review tallied them based on institutional data it collected during the 2016 -17 academic year and/or its student survey for the book. Rating scores are on a scale of 60 to 99. Categories include: Academics, Admissions Selectivity, Financial Aid, Fire Safety, and Green, a measure of school's commitment to the sustainability and the environment in its policies, practices and education programs. Among the ratings in the Champlain profile are scores of 92 for the quality of life and 96 for the green rating. The Princeton Review explains the basis for each rating score in the book and at http://www.princetonreview.com/college-rankings/college-ratings

The Princeton Review's school profiles and ranking lists in "The Best 382 Colleges" are posted at PrincetonReview.com/best382. The Princeton Review also recommends Champlain its website feature, "2018 Best Colleges: Region by Region - Northeast / Midwest / Southeast / West" which salutes 658 schools (all U.S. based schools in "The Best 382 Colleges" plus an additional 278 schools) as outstanding in their regions.

"The Best 382 Colleges" is the 26th annual edition of The Princeton Review's "Best Colleges" book. It is one of 150 Princeton Review books published by Penguin Random House in a line that includes the annually-published "Complete Book of Colleges," "Colleges That Pay You Back," and guides to dozens of standardized tests.

The Princeton Review (www.PrincetonReview.com) is an education services company known for its tutoring, test-prep courses, books, and other student resources. It is headquartered in New York, NY and not affiliated with Princeton University.

About The Princeton Review

The Princeton Review is a leading tutoring, test prep and college admission services company. Every year, it helps millions of college- and graduate school-bound students achieve their education and career goals through online and in person courses delivered by a network of more than 4,000 teachers and tutors, online resources, and its more than 150 print and digital books published by Penguin Random House. The Princeton Review is headquartered in New York, NY. The company is not affiliated with Princeton University. For more information, visit www.princetonreview.com. Follow the company on Twitter @ThePrincetonRev.

About Champlain College

Founded in 1878, Champlain College is a small, not-for-profit, private college in Burlington, Vermont, with additional campuses in Montreal, Quebec and Dublin, Ireland. Champlain offers a traditional undergraduate experience from its beautiful campus overlooking Lake Champlain and more than 60 online undergraduate and graduate degree programs and certificates. Champlain's distinctive career-driven approach to higher education embodies the notion that true learning occurs when information and experience come together to create knowledge. Champlain College is included in the Princeton Review's The Best 382 Colleges: 2018 Edition. Champlain College is featured in the "Fiske Guide to Colleges" for 2018 as one of the "best and most interesting schools" in the United States, Canada, and Great Britain. Champlain was named one of the "Most Innovative Schools" in the North by the U.S. News and World Report's 2017 "America's Best Colleges and #91 in the overall list of "Best Regional Universities in the North. For more information, visit www.champlain.edu.