Which College Offers the Best Value? The Answer May Surprise You

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Finding a quality college education at an affordable price doesn’t have to be as difficult as it sounds.

Kiplinger Personal Finance recently released its list of the best values in public and private colleges for 2015.

Kiplinger considers these measures when ranking universities: admission rate, student-to-faculty ratio, tuition costs, colleges’ financial aid packages, and four-year graduation rates.

Princeton University not only earned a first-place ranking among Kiplinger’s Best Values in Private Colleges, it also placed first among all colleges.

“The generous financial aid package offered by this Ivy League institution helps put it in the top spot, as do its tough admission standards (only 7 percent of applicants get in) and its 6-to-1 student-to-faculty ratio,” Kiplinger said.

Kiplinger said these five universities offer the best college value and include both private and public universities:

  1. Princeton.
  2. Yale.
  3. Swarthmore College.
  4. Washington and Lee University.
  5. Wellesley College.

Here are the top five ranked universities on Kiplinger’s list of the best values in public colleges:

  1. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
  2. University of Virginia.
  3. University of Florida.
  4. University of California, Berkeley.
  5. University of California, Los Angeles.

These universities earned top spots on Kiplinger’s list of the best values in private colleges:

  1. Princeton.
  2. Yale.
  3. Harvard.
  4. Rice.
  5. Duke.

These are the top five universities on Kiplinger’s list of the best college values under $30,000 per year:

  1. SUNY Geneseo.
  2. Brigham Young University.
  3. Berea College.
  4. Truman State University.
  5. New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.

Here are some other best values in college lists from Kiplinger:

What do you think of Kiplinger’s lists of the best value for your college dollar? Share your thoughts below or on our Facebook page.

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