UH 169th out of 310 in annual ranking

The University of Hawaii’s flagship Manoa campus ranked No. 169 out of 310 public and private four-year institutions nationwide, according to U.S. News and World Report’s 2017 Best Colleges rankings.

The rankings, according to U.S. News, focus on academic excellence, with schools rated on various measures of academic quality including graduation and retention rates; class size and student-to-faculty ratio; ACT/SAT scores; student selectivity; and alumni giving.

U.S. News said it assessed more than 1,600 of the nation’s four-year colleges and universities to come up with its list of 310 institutions — 189 public, 114 private and seven for-profit. UH-Manoa was ranked against peers offering a full range of undergraduate majors as well as master’s and doctoral degree programs. The university tied with Union University, a private, Christian liberal arts school in Tennessee.

Last year’s report ranked Manoa No. 161 out of 280 colleges and universities. UH’s overall score climbed by 6 percentage points to 34 over last year’s score. Princeton University, ranked as the No. 1 school on the list of national universities, has an overall score of 100.

On the list of top public universities, UH Manoa landed in the No. 89 spot out of 133 schools. The University of California-Berkeley ranked No. 1 on that list.

The report also ranked universities that offer a full range of undergraduate and master’s programs but few if any doctoral programs. These schools are rated against their peers by region — North, South, West and Midwest.

Chaminade University ranked No. 52 while Hawaii Pacific University and UH-Hilo tied for No. 61 out of 124 schools on the list of Best Regional Universities in the West.

Chaminade, a Catholic college in Kaimuki, tied with four other universities: Holy Names University in California, Humboldt State University, University of Mary Hardin-Baylor in Texas and Walla Walla University in Washington.

HPU, the state’s largest private university, and UH-Hilo tied with four other schools on the regional list: Eastern Washington University and three California State University campuses: Los Angeles, San Bernardino and Stanislaus.

Brigham Young University-Hawaii, meanwhile, ranked No. 14 on the list of Best Regional Colleges in the West. Schools included on this list focus almost entirely on undergraduate programs, the report said.