Schools With The Best Classroom Experience

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Good food and classmates with similar political beliefs are great, but it’s the classroom experience that we’re supposed to be going to college for. However, almost every college student will skip a class at some point, and unfortunately some skip regularly.

Sickness and emergencies are perfectly legitimate reasons for doing this, but more often than not, students skip class because they’re bored, there’s something else they’d rather do, or they simply don’t want to go. Reasons like this indicate they’re not having great classroom experiences.

To nail down the schools that offer the best classroom experiences, The Princeton Review compiles a list every year based on students’ answers to multiple survey questions – how they rate their professors, classrooms, and lab facilities; how much time their classes devote to discussion; and what percentage of their classes they attend.

Looking at this ranking over the past six years, 41 schools have made the list, and five have made it every year: Reed College, the University of Richmond, Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering, the United States Military Academy, and Mount Holyoke College.

All five of these schools also boast a student-to-faculty ratio around 10:1 and an average classroom size of 20 or fewer students, which indicates that the more attention each student gets, the more likely he or she is to attend and enjoy classes – and maybe learn something.

Here are the schools with the “Best Classroom Experience”:

The ‘Best Classroom Experience’ Rankings From 2015 to 2010

 

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2015 Rank & School 2015 Rank 2014 Rank 2013 Rank 2012 Rank 2011 Rank 2010 Rank
 Bard College (NY)  1  4  NR  8  NR  NR
 Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering  2  10  10  3  5  5
 Reed College  3  1  2  4  2  2
 Bennington College  4  2  7  NR  14  17
 Swarthmore College  5  5  1  13  NR  NR
 Whitman College  6  7  5  NR  18  11
 Thomas Aquinas College  7  6  14  NR  20  NR
 Grinnell College  8  3  3  14  NR  NR
 Wabash College  9  12  12  NR  NR  NR
 Mount Holyoke College  10  13  15  7  1  6
 Middlebury College  11  14  13  NR  15  10
 Sarah Lawrence College  12  8  11  NR  16  13
 Hamilton College  13  17  NR  18  17  12
 United States Military Academy  14  11  4  1  4  8
 Scripps College  15  NR  18  NR  NR  NR
 University of Richmond  16  9  9  5  12  18
 Claremont McKenna College  17  18  NR  NR  NR  NR
 University of Chicago  18  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR
 Haverford College  19  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR
 Kenyon College  20  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR
 St. Olaf College  NR  15  NR  NR  NR  NR
 St. John’s College (MD)  NR  16  8  16  13  NR
 St. John’s College (NM)  NR  19  NR  NR  NR  NR
 Wellesley College  NR  20  6  11  6  3
 Bard College at Simon’s Rock (MA)  NR  NR  17  NR  NR  NR
 Denison University  NR  NR  19  NR  NR  NR
 Carleton University  NR  NR  20  NR  NR  NR
 Stanford University  NR  NR  NR  2  3  4
 Princeton University  NR  NR  NR  6  10  9
 Williams College  NR  NR  NR  9  7  7
 Pomona College  NR  NR  NR  10  9  1
 Colby College  NR  NR  NR  12  NR  NR
 Colgate University  NR  NR  NR  15  19  14
 Chaplain College  NR  NR  NR  17  NR  NR
 Bates College  NR  NR  NR  19  NR  NR
 Sweet Briar College  NR  NR  NR  20  8  NR
 Wittenberg University  NR  NR  NR  NR  11  NR
 Marlboro College  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR  15
 Wesleyan College  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR  16
 Bowdoin College  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR  19
 Emerson College  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR  NR

Source: The Princeton Review

DON”T MISS: The Princeton Review: 2015 Rankings