Cal State Long Beach is ranked sixth in the nation for giving students the best bang for their buck, according to Washington Monthly.
The new “Best Bang for the Buck” list by Washington Monthly, a non-profit magazine covering U.S. government and politics, ranked colleges and universities across the country based on their ability to provide low-income students with valuable degrees at affordable prices.
CSULB Interim President Donald Para said he was pleased with the national recognition the campus was awarded for its ability to provide education at a low cost.
“[The campus] aspires to excellence, and our mission is to graduate students with valued degrees,” Para said.
Out of the 1,572 colleges and universities considered for the list, 349 campuses were chosen, according to the Washington Monthly website.
The criteria used to determine ranking included each university’s percentage of students receiving Pell Grants, graduation rates, loan default rates and total amount of tuition paid by students after receiving financial aid.
Among the other top colleges and universities ranked in the “Best Bang for the Buck” list were Cal State Fullerton at No. 4 and San Diego State University at No. 14. The No. 1 ranking university was Amherst College in Massachusetts.
CSULB alumna Jacqueline Ho, who began attending CSULB in 2008 and earned a degree in hospitality management, said she felt like she experienced possibly the worst state the school had ever been in.
“They started cutting sections so you’d have less classes to meet your expected graduation date,” Ho said. “But I know one thing they did to compensate for that was to not allow students to double major after a certain amount of units earned.”
Para said that with a smaller budget, the university administration has sought ways to address student needs and to improve graduation rates.
“After budget reductions, we had to pay attention to what needs the students had,” Para said. “We increased the advising department and helped students get connected early.”
Senior economics major Romie Lyday said while he has never had a positive impression of most Cal State Universities, which he thinks are easy to get into but lack quality education, CSULB was an exception.
“I never thought this about Long Beach,” he said. “I felt that you could bring a [CSULB] degree to a job that people will respect and know who [CSULB] is … [and] I always had high expectations for CSULB.”