Graduate programs ranked among nation’s best

Nancy Marcus, dean of Florida State's Graduate School.

Florida State University has some of the nation’s best graduate programs in education and law, according to U.S. News & World Report’s 2016 edition of “Best Graduate Schools.”

“The inclusion of FSU programs among the nation’s best is evidence of the excellence of our faculty and students across a breadth of disciplines,” said Nancy Marcus, dean of the university’s Graduate School.

Florida State’s College of Education was ranked at No. 40 in a three-way tie with the University of Missouri and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

“I am proud that the College of Education continues to be ranked in the top 40 of almost 300 graduate colleges of education nationwide,” said Marcy Driscoll, dean of the College of Education. “We have worked really hard to maintain high quality programs and grow our research funding, and I’m glad that our efforts are being recognized.”

Florida State’s College of Law was ranked at No. 50 in a tie with Tulane University. Its environmental law program was ranked at No. 17 in a tie with Columbia University.

A subset of the law schools ranking, the nine-month placement rate, rates the College of Law as No. 1 in Florida and No. 26 in the nation in terms of the percentage of 2013 graduates employed nine months after graduation in full-time, long-term, bar passage-required or J.D.-advantage jobs.

“I am delighted that U.S. Newsstill ranks Florida State as Florida’s No. 1 law school, and the nation’s 26th best, in terms of the percentage of 2013 graduates employed nine months after graduation in full-time, long-term, bar passage-required or J.D.-advantage jobs,” said Donald Weidner, dean of the College of Law.

The 2016 edition of “Best Graduate Schools” also contains previously ranked programs, including a No. 7 ranking for Florida State’s criminology program; No. 13 for the library and information studies program, with its school library media program ranked No. 1 in the nation, its services for children and youth ranked 5th and its digital librarianship ranked 11th; No. 16 in public affairs, with its city management and urban policy program ranked No. 15, its public management administration ranked No. 18 and its public-policy analysis ranked No. 28; No. 21 for the speech-language pathology master’s degree program; No. 39 in sociology; No. 40 in political science; No. 44 in social work; and No. 47 in clinical psychology.

U.S. News & World Report ranks professional school programs in business, education, engineering, law, medicine and nursing on an annual basis. The rankings are based on two types of data: expert opinions about program excellence and statistical indicators that measure the quality of a school’s faculty, research and students.

Beyond the six disciplines ranked annually, U.S. News & World Report also periodically ranks programs in the sciences, social sciences, humanities, the health arena and other areas based solely on the ratings of academic experts.