Olin College

Olin College Named a “Best in the Northeast” College by The Princeton Review

Olin College of Engineering is one of the best colleges in the Northeast, according to the nationally known education services company, The Princeton Review. It is one of 220 institutions The Princeton Review recommends in the "Best in the Northeast" section of its website feature, "2012 Best Colleges: Region by Region," that was posted August 1, 2011 on PrincetonReview.com. In the profile on Olin College on its site, The Princeton Review says Olin is revered for its "tight-knit community, rigorous academics, project-based learning, and ingenuous approach to education," and says the college "bridges the gap between a traditional engineering education and [the] real world."

"We're pleased to recommend Olin College to users of our site as one of the best schools to earn their undergrad degree," said Robert Franek, Princeton Review's Senior VP / Publisher. "We chose it and the other terrific institutions we name as ‘regional best' colleges mainly for their excellent academic programs. From several hundred schools in each region, we winnowed our list based on institutional data we collected directly from the schools, our visits to schools over the years, and the opinions of our staff, plus college counselors and advisors whose recommendations we invite."

According to Franek, The Princeton Review also takes into account what students at the schools reported about their campus experiences on an 80-question student survey for the project. Only schools that permit The Princeton Review to independently survey their students are eligible to be considered for the regional ‘best' lists.

"Being chosen as a stand out college in the Northeast is affirmation that our mission to change engineering education is being well received by our students," said Richard K. Miller, president of Olin College. "The evidence supporting our belief that we're creating a distinctive learning environment continues to build. According to The Princeton Review's survey, our students are happy, enjoy their classes, think highly of their professors and they are letting the world know how satisfied they are with their education. That makes us very proud of what we're doing here at Olin College."

The 220 colleges chosen for the "Best in the Northeast" list are located in eleven states: Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Vermont, and the District of Columbia. The Princeton Review also designated 153 colleges in the Midwest, 121 in the West, and 135 in the Southeast as best in their locales on the company's "2012 Best Colleges: Region by Region" lists. Collectively, the 629 colleges named regional bests constitute about 25 percent of the nation's 2,500 four-year colleges.

For this project, The Princeton Review asks students attending the schools to rate their own schools on several issues — from the accessibility of their professors to quality of the campus food — and answer questions about themselves, their fellow students, and their campus life.

The schools in The Princeton Review's "2012 Best Colleges: Region by Region" website section are also rated in six categories by The Princeton Review. The ratings, which appear on the school profiles, are scores on a scale of 60 to 99. The Princeton Review tallied these scores based on institutional data it obtained from the colleges in 2010-11 and/or student survey data. The rating scores Olin College received include: Academics: 99, Admissions Selectivity 99, Financial Aid 99, Fire Safety 87, Quality of Life 98 and Green 67. The Princeton Review explains the criteria for each rating score on its site at http://www.princetonreview.com/college/college-ratings.aspx.

The Princeton Review does not rank the 629 colleges in its "2010 Best Colleges: Region by Region" list hierarchically or by region or in various categories. However, some schools in this list that also appear in The Princeton Review book, "The Best 376 Colleges: 2012 Edition" may appear on some of the Princeton Review ranking lists of "top 20 colleges" in 62 categories that are unique to that book. They are based entirely on the company's surveys of students at the 376 schools in the book.

The Princeton Review, headquartered in Framingham, Mass., and 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.

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