Graduate school shows improvement

Kansas University officials said they were pleased with how the university fared in new U.S. News and World Report graduate school rankings released Thursday.

Overall, 26 KU programs were ranked in the top 25 — up one from last year. And 13 programs were in the top 10, also one more than the previous year.

“We know the schools they highlighted are strong, and that’s indeed what shows up here,” said David Shulenburger, provost and executive vice chancellor. “This is more confirmation for how our schools are doing.”

The rankings are part of the magazine’s 2006 edition of “America’s Best Graduate Schools.”

The special education program in the school of education maintained its top ranking nationally among public universities. The city management and urban policy program also is first in the country among public universities, though a new version of those rankings wasn’t issued this year.

Overall, the school of education improved its ranking to 20th, up from a tie for 25th last year.

The school of pharmacy’s doctoral program cracked the top 25, coming in at 16.

“This is great news for a program that has long had national and international recognition for its outstanding research programs,” Dean Ken Audus said.

Other new rankings included rural medicine, which improved from 22nd to 17th, and petroleum engineering, which was newly ranked at eighth.

One of the biggest improvements among KU graduate programs came in psychology and research in education, which moved up from 103rd to 79th.