ECU scores high for student engagement in new ranking

East Carolina University placed in the top 20% for student engagement in a ranking of U.S. colleges by the Wall Street Journal and Times Higher Education.

The 2021 rankings recognize institutions that foster graduate success and student learning, according to the organizations.

ECU’s Main Campus Student Center welcomes students in 2019. (Photo by Cliff Hollis)

Among schools in the South, ECU ranked 114th out of 208 institutions, placing it in the top 55%.

Overall, a total of 797 colleges across the U.S. were scored on four pillars:

• Engagement (20%) — Student interaction, student recommended, subject breadth): Does the college effectively engage with its students?
• Environment (10%) — Faculty and student diversity, international students, student inclusion): Is the college providing a good learning environment for students? Does it make efforts to attract a diverse student body and faculty?
• Outcomes (40%) — Graduation rate, reputation, graduate salary/value added, debt after graduation: Does the college generate good and appropriate outputs? Does it add value to the students who attend?
• Resources (30%) — Finances per student, faculty per student, papers per faculty: Does the college have the capacity to effectively deliver teaching?

ECU was in the top 20% for engagement, the top 50% for environment and in the top 75% of schools ranked on all four pillars. ECU is among 21 schools in North Carolina listed in the rankings.

A student rides his bike past Joyner Library in 2019. (Photo by Rhett Butler)

Colleges were included in the rankings if they met the threshold for viable (non-missing) data, and the following requirements: Title IV eligible; awards four-year bachelor’s degrees; located in the 50 states or Washington, D.C.; has more than 1,000 students; has 20% or fewer online-only students; is not insolvent.

Data for the rankings come from a variety of sources: the U.S. government (Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System or IPEDS); the U.S. Department of Education’s Federal Student Aid (FSA); the College Scorecard; the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA); the THE U.S. Student Survey; the THE Academic Reputation Survey; and the Elsevier bibliometric dataset.

The student survey examines a range of issues including students’ engagement with their studies, interaction with faculty members and satisfaction with their experience. The student survey was not administered in 2020 due to the pandemic, and student engagement metrics for the rankings were carried over from the 2019 survey.

The reputation survey asks about 10,000 academics, chosen at random from the Elsevier Scopus database, to vote for the best research and teaching universities in the world as well as in their country. The U.S. rankings use only votes from U.S. teachers. The full methodology can be found here.

The rankings are now available online at Times Higher Education. The rankings were first released Sept. 18 to Wall Street Journal subscribers.

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