By CHARLIE BOOTHE
Bluefield Daily Telegraph
ATHENS — A national news website has distinguished Concord University as being the most difficult institution of higher learning in the state to be accepted into as a student.
(Bluefield Daily Telegraph file photo)
Businessinsider.com rankings were based on scores reported to the U.S. Department of Education. That information was compiled by niche.com.
College acceptance rates received a weighted average of 60 percent in the ranking computation, and SAT/ACT scores received a weighted average of 40 percent, according to the website.
Concord was listed with an acceptance rate of 37.8 percent.
“While I am not sure where this group got their information, we are very proud of our long history of quality in providing educational opportunities to our students,” said Dr. Peter L. Viscusi, Concord’s vice president and academic dean. “Our strong programs in business, education, social work, and pre-professional education are our premier areas of emphasis for which we are justly proud.”
Viscusi said students know of Concord’s quality education.
“Our reputation in these fields and other areas of study continue to attract the best and the brightest students in West Virginia and the region,” he said.
Sarah Turner, director of alumni & communication services for Concord, said the statistics used by the website are from the 2014-15 school year.
“According to our institutional research analyst, the acceptance rate in 2014-2015 was 37.8 percent,” she said. “This was based on all freshman applications received.”
That rate goes higher if the statistic is based on only the completed freshman applications, she said.
“A completed application means the university received 100 percent of the information needed for admission,” she said.
Concord joins an elite group of colleges and universities around the country.
As expected, Ivy League schools have the lowest percentage acceptance rates, in the single digits. Harvard’s rate is only 6 percent.
Duke, the most difficult school to get into in North Carolina, has a rate of 11.4 percent.
In Virginia, Washington & Lee has the distinction and has an acceptance rate of 19.5 percent.
In Alabama, though, the University of Alabama is the most difficult with an acceptance rate of 51.1 percent.
Clemson, South Carolina’s top ranked school in this report, has an acceptance rate of 51.5 percent.
The German-owned American businessinsider.com also operates international editions in Australia, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, China, Italy, and the UK. It also operates a local language German[2] and Polish[3] news site.
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