College of Nursing named as one of the top 10 largest distance education programs in U.S. News annual listing

GREENVILLE, N.C. —   Two graduate programs at ECU have been named by U.S. News &World Report in the largest programs for distance education in the magazine’s annual best graduate schools edition.

The ECU College of Nursing is listed in the nursing programs section, and the ECU College of Education is listed in the library science programs.

According to U.S. News, it surveyed 473 programs with 409 responses to compile a list of the largest graduate-level programs measured by enrollment in business, education, engineering, library science, nursing and public health. The top programs appear in the May 2009 publication and www.usnews.com/elearning.

“This ranking emphasizes the strength of our online graduate-level nursing concentrations. The pass rates for our annual national certification exam scores are consistently above 95 percent,” said Dr. Sylvia Brown, acting dean of the College of Nursing. “The combination of national recognition and such high pass rates certainly draws prospective nursing graduate students to ECU.”

The College of Nursing was first named to the U.S. News list in 2004. The school offers seven online options in the master’s of science in nursing program: adult nurse practitioner, clinical nurse specialist, family nurse practitioner, neonatal nurse practitioner, nursing education, nursing leadership and nurse midwifery.

The College of Education’s Department of Library Science offers a totally online, Internet-based Master of Library Science degree. The department has offered online courses since the late 1990s. For more information about the program, visit http://www.ecu.edu/educ/libs/.