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Scripps offers “best of both worlds”

Scripps College is one of the country’s best institutions for undergraduate education, according to The Princeton Review. In its popular guidebook, The Best 371 Colleges, The Princeton Review praises the school for its academics and campus beauty and quotes extensively from Scripps students. Read what they have to say.

The Princeton Review features Scripps College in the 2010 edition of its popular guidebook, The Best 371 Colleges. Robert Franek, Princeton Review’s vice president, commented: “We commend Scripps College for its outstanding academics, which is the primary criteria for our choice of schools for the book.”

Scripps earned an academic rating of 98 (out of 100), 99 for selectivity, 98 for financial aid, and 94 for quality of life. In addition, Scripps earned high marks for “Most Beautiful Campus” and “Dorms Like Palaces,” with a #4 ranking for each, and a #19 ranking for “Easiest Campus to Get Around.”

Among student comments about their campus experiences:

  • “Scripps is a place where women are challenged to stretch themselves academically, have a strong voice, pursue their passions (whatever they may be), and love every minute of it.”
  • “Devoted to creating strong female leaders,” Scripps “is a playground for the mind, body, and spirit that allows you to learn, grow, and understand yourself and the world.”
  • “Inspiring, strong women out to change the world” who are united by curiosity and intellect, all Scripps students “are intelligent and have a passion.” Or, as one student humorously put it, Scripps students are “feminist liberals who will go on to change the world with their elite education, but [they] will do so with fun and style.”

According to many students, Scripps “is the best of both worlds…intimacy of a small school with resources of a small-to-medium university, atmosphere of a women’s college with the benefits of co-education (through the other Claremont Colleges), [and] small-town feel with L.A. an easy hour away by Metrolink.”

Only about 15% of America’s 2,500 four-year colleges and two Canadian colleges are included in the book. It includes detailed profiles of the colleges with school rating scores in eight categories.

The ranking lists in The Best 371 Colleges are based entirely on its survey of 122,000 students (about 325 per campus on average) attending the colleges in the book. The 80-question survey asks students to rate their schools on several topics and report on their campus experience. Topics range from student assessments of their professors, administrators, financial aid, and campus food. Other ranking lists are based on student reports about their student body’s political leanings, race/class relations, gay community acceptance, and other aspects of campus life.

A college’s appearance on a ranking list is entirely the result of a high consensus among its surveyed students about a topic compared with that of students at other schools answering the same survey questions.

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