LEESBURG, FL— A national college information service recently rated Beacon College among Florida’s Top 10 best four-year colleges or universities in its 2016 rankings.
The University of Florida ranked first, while New College of Florida and the University of Miami rounded out the top three. Beacon College — a private, nonprofit liberal arts school with an enrollment of 320 students — rated tenth in the organization’s ranking of the “Best Florida Four-Year Colleges.”
“The BestColleges.com ranking is a very significant one for the 147 private and public accredited institutions of higher education across the state that are privileged to offer a four-year bachelor’s degree,” said Beacon President George Hagerty. “The organization’s rankings are based on verifiable measures of performance, quality, and student outcomes. Beacon College is justifiably proud to be placed among the top 10 institutions in Florida and among the state’s most respected and competitive communities of learning.”
BestColleges.com computed its rankings for Florida’s two-year, four-year and online schools using an objective yardstick — culling metrics such as affordability, enrollment and graduation rates, and student outcomes from the National Center for Education Statistics.
The Top 10 ranking, notes Beacon Provost Dr. Shelly Chandler, “communicates to the educational community, and the community at large, that we are the best at what we do, namely educating students with learning disabilities, ADHD, and learning differences.”
Beacon College, according to BestColleges.com, “is unique among Florida colleges for being the first accredited institution of higher learning to award bachelor’s degrees exclusively to students with dyslexia, ADHD, or other learning disabilities. Beacon has a four-year graduation rate of 83.3 percent, which surpasses the national average for students with learning disabilities.”
The Top 10 ranking by BestColleges.com follows Beacon’s acknowledgement in March by College Magazine as No. 2 among its Top 10 Best Colleges for Students with Learning Disabilities.
The complete BestColleges.com Best Four-year Colleges in Florida Top Ten includes:
- University of Florida – Gainesville, FL
- New College of Florida – Sarasota, FL
- University of Miami – Coral Gables, FL
- University of South Florida – Tampa, FL
- Florida State University – Tallahassee, FL
- University of Central Florida – Orlando, FL
- University of North Florida – Jacksonville, FL
- Rollins College – Winter Park, FL
- Stetson College – DeLand, FL
- Beacon College – Leesburg, FL