The 2023 edition of "The Best 388 Colleges" guide also recognized Elon's career services, campus, performing arts productions, residential facilities and classroom environments.
Elon University has been named one of the best-run colleges in the country by the Princeton Review college guide, with the university also recognized for excellence in academic and student life programs. The 2023 edition of “The Best 388 Colleges,” released Aug. 17, recognizes the top 25 of the country’s 3,000 four-year colleges and universities in 50 categories.
The Princeton Review publishes its ranking lists based on a nationwide survey of 160,000 students as well as information gathered from college administrators. Elon’s profile includes several recognitions, including the following:
#4 — Best-Run Colleges
#6 — Best College Theater
#8 — Most Beautiful Campus
#9 — Best Career Services
#13 — Best College Dorms
#15 — Best College Newspaper
#19 — Their Students Love These Colleges
#20 — Best Classroom Experience
#20 – Happiest Students
“Our selection of the colleges in this book is based on our opinion of their academic offerings. We recommend each one as an academically outstanding choice for an applicant,” said Robert Franek, The Princeton Review’s editor-in-chief and lead author of The Best 388 Colleges. “Our ranking lists, however, are not based on our opinions of the colleges. They’re entirely based on what the schools’ own students have told us about their experiences at them.”
Elon is recognized for its “experiential learning” as well as its “great resources for research” and “fantastic study abroad programs” as it prepares “well-rounded and passionate future leaders.” One student noted that “Elon really works to foster an atmosphere where students can get really close with their professors” thanks in part to “small class sizes, weekly coffee open houses (the College Coffee tradition), mandatory office hours” and other features of campus life.
One student commented that “professors are so kind and want to get to know [you] as a person not just a student. They truly care for [your] well-being, both physical and emotional. They go above and beyond for students.”
The Princeton Review heard that Elon students are highly motivated and highly engaged, with a broad range of organizations and activities and a student body that is supportive. One student explained that “rather than a culture of competition, Elon truly fosters positive collaboration that propels this campus and our community further.” Another noted that “the student body is very inclusive,” and that the students at Elon “genuinely care about the well-being of other people and that is apparent in the social activism that is present on campus.”
The Princeton Review’s 85-question survey asks students to rate their professors, administrators, school services, and other aspects of life at their colleges and to report on their campus and community experiences. Surveys of 160,000 students (about 400 per college on average) were tallied for the rankings lists for 2023. The surveys were conducted in 2021-22 and/or the previous two academic years. Information on the survey process and methodology for the ranking lists is on The Princeton Review’s website where it can be viewed here.
This is the 18th year in a row that Elon has appeared in the Princeton Review’s “Best Colleges” guide. The Best 388 Colleges is the 31st annual edition of The Princeton Review’s “Best Colleges” book and one of 150 Princeton Review books in a line published by Penguin Random House. It has been featured on NBC “TODAY” more than a dozen times, and referenced by reporters in publications from Inside Higher Education to The Wall Street Journal.