The University’s College of Education was ranked fifth in the nation among graduate schools of education in the recently published annual U.S. News and World Report’s survey, its highest national ranking ever. The same survey ranked the college’s special education program third in the nation for the ninth consecutive year, according the college’s Web site.
This year’s survey ranked 242 graduate schools of education based on a quality assessment, student selectivity, faculty resources and research activity, according to the report.
The school earned high scores in its faculty resources and research activities. Its overall ranking is largely due to the success of its research and outreach program coupled with the millions in federal grant money the faculty earn each year, said Linda Mears, the college’s communications director.
“These ratings are indicators of how others perceive our education programs and are a great testament to the hard work of our faculty to leverage federal funding to change and improve school and social services systems,” said Michael Bullis, dean of the College of Education.
Bullis said about 75 percent of the survey’s quality ranking comes from peer evaluation from the deans of other graduate schools and superintendents of a sampling of school districts nationwide.
“A lot of the rating weight has to do with how successful the faculty are at attaining research awards,” Mears said.
Mears said the school earned more than $28 million for research last year, contributing to the high ranking. In addition, the school was ranked first overall in faculty productivity, meaning it successfully utilized the federal and state grant money awarded, she said.
The school developed a Research and Outreach program that Mears said better serves the community by combining its research units with outreach units.
“The outreach program is the school’s way of teaching people to apply its research findings,” Mears said.
The faculty integrates this research into its curriculum, and education students have the opportunity to assist with both research and outreach implementation.
The education school has nine research units and eight outreach units, but both programs work together to connect the community to the latest research, according to the University Web site.
Bullis said the school’s outreach program extends to all 50 states and every school district in Oregon.
The overwhelming success of the special education program, which was again ranked third in the nation this year, is the main reason the college was ranked so highly overall, Mears said.
The survey bases the school’s overall rank partly on the school’s research activity by combining its total research expenditures averaged over the fiscal year with “the average research expenditures per full-time tenured and tenure-track faculty member,” according to the report.
The University’s College of Education scored high in this area overall partly because of the research awards earned by special education faculty.
“We bring in more money to the (College of Education) than any other area,” said Jane Squires, director of the school’s Early Intervention Program.
The Early Intervention Program combines both the research and outreach goals that the college promotes, Mears said.
The program developed the most widely used developmental screening test in the U.S. to detect mild developmental delays in children.
According to the University Web site, the test requires “no more than 15 minutes of a parent’s time before or after a doctor’s appointment (and) is credited with a 224 percent increase in referrals of 1-year-old and 2-year-old children with mild developmental delays in a yearlong study.”
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