The University of Maryland, College Park's drive for national respect got a boost yesterday from the annual rankings of graduate schools issued by U.S. News and World Report.
Though the meteoric rise of UMCP's engineering school ended, doctoral programs in many of its science departments remained strong:
UMCP's computer science department was 11th in the country, physics was 14th, and mathematics 21st. Those departments outranked their counterparts at the Johns Hopkins University.
Hopkins' biological sciences ranked sixth in the country and geology was ninth, while UMCP did not make the top 25 in those two disciplines.
UMCP's engineering school was 17th, down from 13th last year, but ahead of Hopkins' Whiting School of Engineering at 25th.
"Our only disappointment was that the business school didn't make the top 25 -- it was 26th," said William W. Destler, UMCP's vice president for university advancement. "But we're very pleased in general. No one was talking this way about College Park even 10 years ago. It shows how far we've come."
Provost Gregory L. Geoffrey agreed. "Of course, you always hope to do a bit better, but overall it's a good reflection of what's going on around here. Our goal is to get the business school into the top 15 and we're going to be working on a lot of fronts to get it there."
The numbers differed only slightly from the last time U.S. News ranked science departments three years ago.
Medical, engineering, law and education schools are ranked each year, while other health specialties, arts, humanities and social sciences are, like science departments, ranked every three years.
Hopkins retained its now-customary second place in medicine, behind Harvard, while the medical school at the University of Maryland, Baltimore came in 48th (on a chart expanded from 25 places).
UMCP's education school was ranked 22nd. New this year are rankings for schools of library science; the College Park campus came in 14th.
UMB's law school did not make the nation's top 50, but it did quite well in some specialties -- tying for third in clinical training, second in health law and ninth in environmental law.
Professional school rankings are based on a variety of factors, with reputation as determined by a survey of the field counting 40 percent. Student selectivity, job placement, research activity and faculty resources are some other factors. Department rankings are determined by a vote of department heads across the country.
Pub Date: 3/19/99