U.S. News top grad school rankings include several UC programs

The rankings are based on expert opinions about program excellence and statistical indicators that measure the quality of a school's faculty, research and students. UC colleges celebrating strides include the James L. Winkle College of Pharmacy, the College of Nursing, the College of Law, the Carl H. Lindner College of Business and the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning.

The Winkle College of Pharmacy leaped from 33rd last year to 30th in this year’s U.S. News graduate school rankings.

“This past year was the best year in the 170-year history of the college for research funding,” says Neil MacKinnon, pharmacy dean, who points out that the number of pharmacy schools in the country have grown to around 150. “We have made significant investments into the research enterprise of the college over the past few years, including several new faculty hires, hiring the college’s first associate dean for research and innovation, and creating a new grants administrator position. So, much of the credit goes to our research faculty and the staff and students in their labs.”

The UC College of Nursing saw both its Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) and Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) programs jump 10 spots from last year. The MSN program jumped from 61 last year to 51 this year and the DNP moved from 50 to 40.

“We are excited to see the UC College of Nursing once again listed among the top graduate programs in the country, but our true accomplishment is knowing that we are preparing advanced-practice nurses who, in times of increasing health inequities, can make a difference by directly influencing the well-being of patients and providing quality and safe care to all,” says Greer Glazer, dean of the UC College of Nursing.

In one year, the Carl H. Lindner College of Business part-time MBA saw its ranking move 20 spots from 109 to 89.

“Flexibility and accessibility are essential for business professionals seeking to elevate their credentials and deepen their experience in their respective fields,” says Marianne Lewis, dean at the Lindner College of Business. “Our college’s efforts to deliver a part-time MBA program that is ‘just right’ in terms of size, pace, course offerings and experiential learning opportunities in a highly competitive market have paid off, given the recent rankings from U.S. News & World Report.”

While the overall ranking at the UC College of Law remained the same at No. 83 nationally, several individual programs saw significant positive movement including clinical training (from 157 to 127), environmental law (from 132 to 116) and tax law (from 91 to 68). Four other programs were ranked for the first time and ranked in the top-100 including business corporate law (78th), contracts-commercial law (98th), criminal law (68th) and constitutional law (93rd).

“We're confident that the law school is on a positive trajectory, the result of the hard work of many people,” says UC College of Law Dean Verna Williams, whose college celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Urban Morgan Institute for Human Rights and marked the world premiere of the “Blind Injustice” opera, stories based on the success of the Ohio Innocence Project. “We're nationally ranked as a Best Value Law School by National Jurist and preLaw magazines, and many of our programs are listed on their honor rolls. It's for these reasons and many more that we look forward to what the future holds for us."

Several graduate programs were ranked for the first time by U.S. News, including fine arts programs. UC’s program in the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning (DAAP) came in at No. 53.

“The ranking of DAAP’s fine arts program is evidence of the creativity and hard work of our esteemed faculty and the commitment DAAP has made to this program,” says dean Timothy Jachna. “This year the program is also benefiting from the recent opening of our Fine Arts Annex building, a dedicated space where our students now have the room and resources to truly explore their discipline.”

The data for the rankings comes from statistical surveys of more than 2,081 programs and from reputation surveys sent to more than 24,603 academics and professionals, conducted in fall 2019 and early 2020. Find more details on the Best Grad Schools complete listing.

UC also has many other programs ranked among the best in the nation, however, U.S. News only ranks select programs each year. See UC's complete rankings.