Profile: We've got great references

A Princeton Review book, Colleges with a Conscience: 81 Great Schools with Outstanding Community Involvement, listed Portland State for its excellent service-learning programs that blend academics with community work.

Portland State is the only higher education institution in Oregon to make the U.S. President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll for Distinguished Community Service.

The School of Business Administration ranked 22nd on a list of Global Top 100 Schools in the 2007-2008 edition of Beyond Grey Pinstripes for integrating social and environmental issues into its MBA+ program.

PSU's Community Watershed Stewardship Program, in collaboration with the city of Portland, won the first-ever United States National Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Partnership Award for Campus Community Collaboration. The program has led more than 27,000 community volunteers to donate a quarter million hours to install 80,000 plants and restore 50 acres of watershed along two miles of waterways.

The Association of American Colleges and Universities' report, "College Learning for the New Global Century," recognized Portland State as a leader in fostering civic, intercultural, and ethical learning. The report highlighted the University Studies program, which "helps students become more aware of their own biases and prejudices and deepens students' understanding of sociopolitical issues."

2009 Edition America's Best Colleges

Up and Coming Schools

Portland State University is ranked seventh among "Up-and-Coming" national universities to watch by U.S. News & World Report in its "America's Best Colleges 2009" edition. The colleges and universities recognized were "identified by top college officials in spring 2008 as schools that have recently made the most promising and innovative changes in academics, faculty, students, campus, or facilities."

Programs to Look For

For the seventh year in a row, Portland State University ranked among the nation's best colleges in five categories that lead to student success, according to the same "America's Best Colleges" report.

First-Year Experience

Orientation can go only so far in making freshmen feel connected. Many schools now build into the curriculum first-year seminars or other academic programs that bring small groups of students together with faculty or staff on a regular basis.

Duke University
Indiana University – Purdue University
James Madison University
Ohio State University – Columbus
Portland State University
Stanford University
University of Maryland
University of Minnesota
University of Notre Dame
University of Texas
Partial list of 24 institutions.

Learning Communities

In learning communities, students typically take two or more linked courses as a group and get to know one another and their professors well. Some learning communities are also residential.

Georgia State University
Indiana University
Indiana University – Purdue University
Iowa State University
Miami University
Ohio State University
Portland State University
Stanford University
Syracuse University
University of California – Santa Cruz
University of Maryland
University of Michigan
Partial list of 22 institutions.

Service Learning

In service-learning programs, required (or for credit) volunteer work in the community is an instructional strategy. What's learned in the field bolsters what happens in class and vice versa.

Brown University
Duke University
Indiana University – Purdue University
Michigan State University
Ohio State University
Portland State University
Stanford University
Tulane University
University of Maryland
University of Michigan
University of North Carolina
University of Notre Dame
University of Pennsylvania
Partial list of 25 institutions.

Internships

Schools nominated in this category require or encourage students to apply what they're learning in the classroom to work in the real world—through closely supervised internships or practicums, or through cooperative education, in which one period of study typically alternates with one of work.

Drexel University
Kettering University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
New York University
Northeastern University
Portland State University
Purdue University
Rochester Institute of Technology
Partial list of 14 institutions.

Senior Capstone

Whether they're called a senior capstone or go by some other name, these culminating experiences ask students nearing the end of their college years to create a project of some sort that integrates and synthesizes what they've learned. The project might be a thesis, a performance, or an exhibit of artwork.

Allegheny College
Alverno College
Carleton College
College of Wooster
Elon University
Georgia Institute of Technology
Harvard University
Harvey Mudd College
Kalamazoo College
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Portland State University
Princeton University
Reed College
Southern Illinois University – Edwardsville
Swarthmore College
Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Yale University

Portland State University serves as a center of opportunity for nearly 27,000 undergraduate and graduate students. Located in Portland, Oregon, one of the nation's most livable cities, the University's innovative approach to education combines academic rigor in the classroom with field-based experiences through internships and classroom projects with community partners. The University's 49-acre downtown campus exhibits a commitment to sustainability with green buildings, while many of the 213 bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees incorporate sustainability into the curriculum. PSU's motto, "Let Knowledge Serve the City," inspires the teaching and research of an accomplished faculty whose work and students span the globe.

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