By Mary Haley, Staff Writer

Manhattan College was recently ranked highly on both the Washington Monthly’s “Best Bang for the Buck” list and on U.S. News & World Report’s “Best Regional Universities North Ranking” list. 

According to the Washington Monthly’s website, a ranking takes place each year that is based on what contributions colleges make to the country. This year, the college was featured on the “Best Bang for the Buck” list, rising from 96th to 40th place. 

William Clyde, Ph.D., interim vice president and provost, spoke on the connection of this ranking to the school’s strong alumni success and networking. 

“A lot of the rankings are about how our graduates are doing ten to fifteen years down the road,” Clyde said. “[The rankings] have to do with how the graduates are doing, and how their salaries are relative to those [graduates] from other schools.” 

Clyde also emphasized the advantage of being in New York City, explaining how often students get internships that eventually turn into jobs. 

“People get internships, people get jobs, people have experiences in New York City, and that means that they go on to careers that are very successful,” Clyde said. 

Four-year colleges considered on U.S. News & World Report’s list must meet the criteria of offering undergraduate and masters programs and are split into four sections: north, west, midwest and south. Manhattan College ranked sixteenth in the north region. 

Along with this high ranking, the college was also recognized for its efforts in social mobility and was ranked no. 48 of 178 colleges and universities for undergraduate engineering in the region. Tim Ward, Ph.D., dean of the school of engineering, shared his thoughts on the cohesiveness of engineering programs with a liberal arts education. 

“It’s because we are in a liberal arts college that makes a difference in the quality of the students who graduate from our engineering programs,” Ward said. “If you talk with our graduates, they know it’s not just the engineering they’ve learned, but also of the other things about life and other cultures, other religions and other people.” 

While reflecting on his time at Manhattan College, Ward explained how the college’s demographic was changed during the 2008 recession and how one out of three Manhattan students are in the school of engineering. 

“When I got here in 2008, right when the huge recession was about to start, the school of engineering and the school of liberal arts had the same number of undergraduate students. The next year, we surpassed them, because students and their parents wanted their sons and daughters to be in a STEM field,” Ward said. 

The SGA president, Calissa McNeely, senior international studies major, explained how Manhattan College recognizes and has been improving student’s social mobility. 

“With [social mobility] being the idea we are honing in on and agreeing on, I think that means that Manhattan College is doing something right considering education right now is something that is really expensive for most people, and it’s really good that people are getting the education that they paid for, hopefully, and utilizing that as a resource to take them into different opportunities,” McNeely said.

This ranking not only highlights the quality college education Manhattan College has made accessible to students, but also is a reflection on the faculty behind these projects. 

“I think it says something that there are people who are working hard on this campus to make sure people are able to access the resources that are here,” McNeely said.

“I feel like this is more of knocking on a door for the school to be like, ‘Hey, there are some really great people on this campus who are doing really great work’.”