College Raptor, a leading mobile-first college platform that helps families discover colleges based on academic and cultural fit, as well as personalized estimates of actual cost, has included West Virginia Wesleyan College in the list of schools named as “Hidden Gems in the Northeast.”
The selection recognizes Wesleyan as one of the best colleges in the country, based on a combination of factors, including number of applications received, graduation rates, campus diversity, endowment per student, and other key metrics as reported via the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) for the most recently available academic year.
“Finding hidden gems for students is core to how we help students and families discover great college choices. That’s why we love putting out our Hidden Gems lists each year to highlight excellent schools like West Virginia Wesleyan College,” said Bill Staib, CEO of College Raptor.
College Raptor’s Hidden Gems began in 2014 in tandem with their Best Colleges Rankings, in an attempt to showcase incredible schools of high quality and overall health. Their rankings comprises a number of specific factors that are then combined into a single weighted score, which determines a college’s overall rank.
The full list of factors that are included in the College Raptor rankings are as follows:
- First-year retention rates
- Median SAT/ACT score for incoming freshmen
- Average faculty salary
- Student-to-faculty ratio
- Selectivity index
- Endowment per student
- Four-year graduation rate
- Six-year graduation rate
West Virginia Wesleyan College in one of three West Virginia schools to be selected as a Hidden Gem. Wesleyan offers over 40 majors of study and graduate programs in athletic training, business, creative writing, and nursing. Wesleyan is also listed again as a “Best Southeastern College” by the Princeton Review and has been the only West Virginia college or university to be listed as a “Best Value School” for five consecutive years in U.S. News & World Reports’ Best Colleges.