MONEY magazine identifies SRU as a ‘best value’

Aug. 27, 2019

SLIPPERY ROCK, Pa. — Slippery Rock University has been recognized by MONEY Magazine as one of the nation's best value universities, making the list of the publication's "Best Colleges for Your Money."

"Our faculty and staff work incredibly hard to make a positive difference in the lives of our students in order to prepare them for wherever life may take them," said William Behre, SRU president. "That dedication to providing a high-quality, 'Rock Solid' education at an affordable price is evidenced by our inclusion on this list among the country's best value institutions."

To determine which of the country's four-year colleges and universities deliver the most value, MONEY editors determined that a university or college had to:

• Have at least 500 students.
• Have sufficient, reliable data to be analyzed.
• Not be in financial distress.
• Have a graduation rate that was at or above the median for its institutional category (public or private), or have a high "value-added" graduation rate (score in the top 25% of MONEY's test of graduation rates after accounting for the average test scores and percentage of low income students among an institution's enrollees).

A total of 744 schools met these requirements and were ranked on 26 factors in three categories, including: quality of education, affordability and outcomes (alumni success) from information gathered by PayScale.com.

MONEY also used statistical techniques to turn all data points into a single score and ranked the schools based on those scores.

SRU, ranked No. 434, joined nine other schools from Pennsylvania's State System of Higher Education to make the list, including: West Chester (179), Bloomsburg (420), Shippensburg (584), California (610), Kutztown (653), Millersville (661), Indiana (695), Clarion (707) and Mansfield (716).

A complete list of MONEY's 2019-20 best value universities can be found by clicking here.

An in depth explanation of MONEY's ranking methodology can be found by clicking here.

MEDIA CONTACT: Robb King | 724.738.2199 | robb.king@sru.edu