DesRoches on national rankings for Rice graduate programs: 'A reflection of the quality of faculty, staff and students'

A private university in Houston had several graduate programs place on the newly published U.S. News and World Report’s “Best Graduate Schools” rankings, according to a press release. 

Rice University’s nationally ranked George R. Brown School of Engineering and Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business account for a combined nine programs in the rankings.

The university said that the 30th-ranked Brown School earned recognition for its master’s programs in bioengineering/biomedical, environmental engineering, chemical engineering, electrical engineering, civil engineering, materials engineering and mechanical engineering. 

According to the release, the entrepreneurship and the professional master’s of business administration (MBA) program represented the 24th-ranked Jones School on the list. 

“[They’re] a reflection of the quality of faculty, staff and students and the impact of the research and scholarship produced from these programs,” Rice President Dr. Reginald DesRoches said in the release. “Increasing the number of top-ranked graduate programs is part of my vision for the university. I’m proud to see we are making progress in this important area.”

Dr. Amy Dittmar, the university’s Howard R. Hughes Provost, shared DesRoches' sentiments. 

"I am proud to see so many of Rice University's graduate programs earning top rankings from U.S. News," Dittmar said, according to the release. “It is an affirmation of the hard work of our faculty, deans, department chairs and Dean of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies Dr. Seiichi Matsuda and his team.”

Matsuda said students are a huge priority. 

"I appreciate this recognition of the quality of our graduate programs and the achievements of our students, who are endlessly curious, bright and ambitious," Matsuda said in the release. "We are committed to building programs in which students can achieve their hopes and their dreams, and I look forward to seeing Rice's graduate rankings continue to improve." 

The university’s departments of earth, environmental and planetary sciences; physics and astronomy; chemistry; mathematics and computer science were also ranked, the release said. 

Expert opinions and statistical indicators that gauge the quality of faculty, research and students determine the Best Graduate School rankings, U.S. News said in the release. 

The national media outlet said that it used data from a few surveys given to academics and professionals in fall 2022 and earlier this year.