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(August 26, 2010) — New College of Florida has once again been named one of the country’s best institutions for undergraduate education, according to The Princeton Review.  The education services company features New College in the new 2011 edition of its popular guidebook, The Best 373 Colleges: 2011 Edition (Random House/ Princeton Review, $22.99).  Only about 15% of America’s 2,500 four-year colleges and two Canadian colleges are profiled in the book, which is The Princeton Review’s flagship college guide.

This marks the ninth consecutive year that New College has been included in The Princeton Review’s annual Best Colleges’ issue. The school also regularly appears in the Princeton Review’s annual rankings of Best Value Colleges.

“We commend New College for its outstanding academics, which is the primary criteria for our selection of schools for the book,” states Robert Franek, Princeton Review’s Senior VP/ Publishing and author of The Best 373 Colleges.   “Our choices are based on institutional data we collect about schools, our visits to schools over the years, feedback we gather from students attending the schools, and the opinions of our staff and our 28-member National College Counselor Advisory Board.  We also work to keep a wide representation of colleges in the book by region, size, selectivity and character.”

In its profile on New College, The Princeton Review states, “The academics are undeniably awesome, while the small-school setting and the student body encourage a love of learning, whether it be academic, political or hobby-related.” The guidebook calls New College a “uniquely small and unconventional public institution [that] provides challenging courses for highly self-motivated students who want a large amount of control over their academic choices.”

In addition to profiles of each of the institutions included in the book, The Best 373 Colleges includes 62 ranking lists that The Princeton Review tallies based on institutional data collected from the schools during the 2009-10 academic year and/or its student survey for the book.  These lists identify the top 20 colleges in categories covering a wide range of topics including academics, administrative services, financial aid, campus amenities (like dorms and food), the student body’s political leanings, race/class interaction, LGBT community acceptance, social life and much more.

Among the ranking lists in which New College was included for 2011 are the following:

  • #9 for Professors Get High Marks
  • #7 for Great Financial Aid
  • #7 for Students Happy with Financial Aid
  • #5 for Most Politically Active Students
  • #12 for Gay Community Accepted, and
  • #2 for Dodgeball Targets — a wink to the College’s lack of intramural athletic programs.

The Best 373 Colleges is the 19th edition of The Princeton Review’s annual “best colleges” book.   It is one of about 165 Princeton Review books published by Random House in a line that also includes the annual guides, The Complete Book of Colleges and The Best Northeastern Colleges.  The Princeton Review, headquartered in Framingham, MA with editorial offices in New York City and test preparation locations across the country and abroad, is not affiliated with Princeton University and it is not a magazine.

For more information on New College’s rankings in The Princeton Review’s The Best 373 Colleges visit PrincetonReview.com or contact the New College Office of Public Affairs at 941-487-4153 / email [email protected].