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News Release

November 02, 2006

U of G No. 1 in Maclean's

The University of Guelph reclaimed the No. 1 spot in the annual Maclean’s rankings of universities released today. It’s the third national survey in recent days to name Guelph the top comprehensive university in Canada.

“Obviously, we are very pleased to once again be named No. 1,” said president Alastair Summerlee. “The Maclean’s ranking caps off quite an astonishing week for us — three top placements — and this remarkable achievement is due entirely to the extraordinary people and programs we have at Guelph.”

Tuesday, Guelph was ranked at the top of its class for overall educational quality, reputation and atmosphere in the 2006 University Report Card published by the Globe and Mail. Last week, U of G was named Canada’s top comprehensive research institution in the annual Top 50 Research Universities ranking.

In the Maclean’s overall survey, Guelph was named the top comprehensive university in Canada, followed by the University of Waterloo and the University of Victoria.

Guelph was ranked first in five of the key areas that determine the placements — quality of students, graduation rates, classes taught by tenured faculty, quality of faculty and student services. The university also maintained or improved its performance in 19 other categories.

In an accompanying reputational survey in the magazine, Guelph was ranked second overall and second in each of three categories used to determine reputation: highest quality, most innovative, leaders of tomorrow.

Maclean’s also published the results of its graduate survey, where participants were asked to rate their alma mater. In that survey, Guelph was No. 1 among comprehensive universities in seven of the eight categories for educational excellence.

U of G was also named the top comprehensive university by Maclean’s in 2003, 2002 and 1999.

The magazine defines comprehensive universities as those with a significant amount of research activity and a wide range of programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Its two other categories are medical/doctoral and primarily undergraduate. To determine the rankings, the magazine uses 23 indicators to measure overall quality within six general themes: student body, classes, faculty, finances, library and reputation.

The Maclean’s reputational survey is based on comments solicited from 11,430 people across the country, including CEOs of major Canadian corporations, high school counsellors and academic administrators.

This year, a number of Canadian universities declined to voluntarily participate in the Maclean’s survey and did not submit self-reported information. For those universities, the magazine obtained the data used in the survey through other means, including the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA). In the comprehensive category, only one university in the top five did not submit information.

Summerlee adds that the Maclean’s ranking, University Report Card and other attitudinal surveys and rankings of Canadian universities are just some of the resources future students can use in deciding which institution best fits their needs.

“Achieving this level of success takes an incredible amount of time and effort,” Summerlee said. “I want to once again thank all of our faculty, students, staff and alumni for their caring and commitment, which is what sets Guelph apart from others.”