Urbana, IL - The University of Illinois electrical engineering (EE) undergraduate program ranked second nationally in the 2002 U.S. News & World Report's America's Best Colleges survey. The EE program moved up in the survey from last year when it was tied for third. The survey was published in the September 17 issue of U.S. News and is available on the Web at U.S. News College Rankings.
"Finally, external recognition is catching up with internal quality," said Seth Hutchinson, ECE associate head for undergraduate affairs. "These rankings mirror our department's longstanding distinction among major research universities."
"External rankings are not the main way in which we judge ourselves," said ECE Department Head Richard Blahut, "but it is nice to see them when they come in."
According to U.S. News, specialty disciplines' rankings -- electrical engineering, for example -- were determined by deans and senior faculty of engineering schools who nominated up to 10 of the best programs in each specialty area. The U.S. News rankings included two categories: schools whose highest degree offered is a PhD and schools whose highest degree offered is a bachelor's or master's degree.
In April, U.S. News published its annual survey of graduate study programs. The Illinois electrical and computer engineering graduate programs ranked third and fifth, respectively, in that survey.