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Despite having only 850 students, New College of Florida looms large on lists that rank colleges in everything from academics to youthful energy.
The latest list the school made is Kiplinger's Personal Finance annual ranking of the 100 best values in public colleges. The school moved up to fifth on the 2012 list, from 11th last year.
Kiplinger's cites New College's “low sticker price” of total in-state tuition, which is $15,458 a year and includes room, board, books and supplies. That price tag is less than half the average price for private schools, and is even less than the national average for public schools, Kiplinger's reports.
“We tend to have very good scores on lists that mix costs and values,” says New College Public Affairs Director Jake Hartvigsen.
The school also tends to score well on quirky lists. Newsweek once named it a top 10 “most-free spirited school” and Mother Jones magazine ranked it high on a list of “cool colleges that will blow your mind, not your budget.” And one publication ranked New College No. 1 in the country for “dodge ball targets,” a reference to the school's nerdier side.
Another list New College scores well on is one administrators don't brag about. That would be lists that rank schools with the most marijuana use. The Toke of the Town website, for example, ranked New College ninth nationwide on its 2011 widely used marijuana list — one behind Eckerd College in St. Petersburg.
Then, finally, there's the Holy Grail of college rankings: The Princeton Review's “top 20” lists. New College consistently scores well on those lists in financial aid, professors and politically active students.
The school utilizes the rankings to reach out to prospective students and their parents. But Hartvigsen says it's more important to do the right things that get the school on the lists, not simply boast about being ranked. Says Hartvigsen: “We don't want to make a fetish out of rankings.”
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