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My daughter goes to UB (the UB Teach 5 year combined and accelerated Bachelor/Masters program, BS in Health and Human Services, Psychology minor, Masters in Elementary Ed) and my sister went there for grad school (PhD in Psychology, she's now the head of the Psych Dept. at Daemen). Yay for UB!
"Every few years, the New York Times Magazine compiles a college-access index ranking the nation’s most selective universities in order of economic diversity.
This year’s index, updated for the first time since 2017, ranks New York’s two SUNY flagships, the University at Buffalo and Stony Brook University, among the top 30 most economically diverse schools in the country.
It is a ranking that is more relevant than ever in light of the Supreme Court ruling prohibiting colleges from considering racial diversity in admissions, the Times wrote in its recent education issue. The ruling is prompting many institutions to seek other ways to diversify and increase access to all students, as well as reconsidering traditional “legacy” admissions that favor family of alumni.
The Times measured economic diversity by looking at the 286 most selective U.S. universities and how many of their students received Pell Grants, which typically go to students at the low end of the income scale.
The index ranks UB 28th in the country overall and eighth among public universities. Among 50 state flagships, UB is No. 2 nationally, second to Stony Brook, which was ranked 16th overall.
The most diverse school was Berea College in Kentucky, a school devoted to low-income students where 94% of the 2020-21 incoming class received Pell Grants. The next closest school was Salem College, with 69%.
Stony Brook had 39% of freshmen coming in on Pell Grants, while UB had 34%, a six-point increase since 2011. The overall average of all 286 schools was 21%, according to The Times.
UB Provost Scott Weber said the new index supports UB’s reputation for “providing an excellent education to students from all walks of life.”
“At UB, we are enriched and benefit from having a community of student scholars from a range of economic backgrounds,” Weber said. “Ensuring students have access to a world-class education as they work toward achieving their dreams is part of our DNA.”
The Times said the recent Supreme Court ruling puts “a renewed focus on institutional efforts to consider wealth in making admissions decisions,” and added, “This list shows us how schools are doing.”
Looks like UB fell to 89th among National Universities and fell to 38th among Public Universities and fell 88 spots to 188 in value. Funny how this update isn't mentioned in a thread devoted to rankings. That's a huge drop in value
"University at Buffalo President Satish Tripathi used his annual State of the University Address to announce a $40 million gift to its engineering school from alumnus Russell Agrusa, who graduated from UB in 1976 and went on to launch a multibillion-dollar automation software company.
The donation will help UB construct a new engineering school building and support engineering research and education, Tripathi said. The new academic building will be named Russell L. Agrusa Hall.
A new engineering hub has been in UB’s plans for years, and in early 2022, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced the $102 million project and pledged $68 million in state funding to help build it. UB needs to raise the other $34 million, and half of Agrusa’s gift – $20 million – will be used for that purpose. The building remains in the design phase, but Tripathi called the donation “a monumental advance regarding this project.”
Agrusa’s other $20 million gift will help support UB’s quest to ramp up its spending on research, much of it coming out of its School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, and the growth of its engineering programs, which have seen a dramatic increase in enrollment to match increasing demand for STEM professionals across the state and nation, Tripathi said.
Agrusa, who retired as president and CEO of Iconics in 2020, has served on the UB engineering school’s advisory council since 2003. After earning his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering at UB, he studied computer science at Boston University and started his career at Westinghouse Electric Corp. He founded Iconics in 1986 and grew it into a Microsoft partner company that counts 70% of Fortune 1,000 companies as its customers.
Agrusa said he met his late wife, Paula, when they were both students at UB and she helped him build his software firm as its chief financial officer. She always wanted to give back to their alma mater, and he continued to do so after her death in 2016. In 2021, he funded the creation of a pocket park, Paula’s Plaza, near the UB School of Management.
Agrusa said he wants to help transform lives through rapidly growing engineering fields like computer science and AI. “I would not be where I am today without UB,” he said.
Tripathi also announced that Agrusa’s gift pushed UB over the $1 billion goal for its Boldly Buffalo fundraising campaign. UB launched the campaign in 2018 to raise $650 million for improvements and growth in its facilities, faculty, research and student experiences. After reaching that goal in 2021, Tripathi extended the campaign and set the new goal at $1 billion. He said the campaign isn’t over and will continue through next spring.
Tripathi saved the fundraising announcements for the latter part of his speech at Slee Hall’s Lippes Concert Hall. His address also listed a number of other UB goals that it met in the past year or is on track to hit, as well as goals for the future.
Two big ones were launching a hiring initiative to increase and diversify its faculty – which brought 154 new faculty members to campus this fall – and increasing its sponsored research expenditures by 16% this year, to $232 million.
UB kicked off 2023 with a huge federal grant, $20 million from the National Science Foundation to create a national AI Institute at UB to develop artificial intelligence solutions that assist children with disabilities – starting with a project to use AI to identify and diagnose speech and language challenges in young children.
UB also invested in bolstering its Blackstone LaunchPad student entrepreneurial program that has helped launch dozens of startups in the Buffalo area and provided support to over 300, he said. The LaunchPad, recently rebranded as the UB Startup and Innovation Colaboratory – The CoLab – went from one employee to five and from 800 square feet to 2,800 square feet of office space in UB’s Student Union, greatly increasing its ability to reach more students and offer more entrepreneurial skill-building experiences.
Tripathi also noted that UB was confronted with two significant issues this year – free speech and affirmative action. The spring semester saw student protests seeking to cancel a speech by conservative commentator Michael Knowles after he opined that “transgenderism” should be eradicated from our society. In June, the Supreme Court declared consideration of race in college applications to be unconstitutional, which many institutions saw as a move against diversity and inclusion.
“To the principle of free speech: Let me underscore how critical it is to uphold this constitutional right, not only in the abstract, nor when it is convenient to do so, but also when the speech in question offends our sensibilities,” Tripathi said.
“Heckling, shouting down our opponents, suppression, censorship – these have no place in higher education,” he added. “But opposing ideas we reject with robust arguments grounded in truth, reason and justice? This is what higher education prepares us to do.”
He said UB continues to foster diversity and inclusion by creating a welcoming environment for all and offering opportunities for students and faculty from all backgrounds to connect, bond and succeed."
“Entrepreneur magazine and the Princeton Review recently named the University at Buffalo among the top 15% of the country’s schools for undergraduate entrepreneurship studies.
UB was ranked No. 44 nationwide in the annual ranking, up four spots from its debut last year. UB also ranked No. 7 in the Northeast. The ranking is based on a 2023 survey of nearly 300 schools with entrepreneurship offerings.
UB leaders attribute its spot on the list to its success in building a flourishing entrepreneurial ecosystem on campus, including the UB Startup and Innovation Collaboratory powered by Blackstone LaunchPad, UB Business and Entrepreneur Partnerships and its 2-year-old startup Cultivator program, and the UB Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership.
UB students can take advantage of many entrepreneurship courses, competitions, boot camps, workshops, design challenges, coaching, incubators and even early-stage funding and investment programs throughout the year. UB’s Cultivator helps early-stage startups in Western New York scale their businesses.
“We’re dedicated to shaping the future of our students by providing experiential learning opportunities that complement the curriculum and ignite the spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation,” says Hadar Borden, director of UB’s Startup and Innovation Collaboratory powered by Blackstone LaunchPad, also known as CoLab.
“Through these initiatives, we empower our students to cultivate their entrepreneurial skills, as well as a mindset that propels them to build both companies and successful careers,” Borden said.
UB CoLab activities include a weekly Innovate and Caffeinate event that invites innovators and makers to have coffee and brew ideas on Thursday evenings, and Get Seeded, a monthly “pitch” event for student entrepreneurs to get their ideas off the ground with $500 and $250 first and second prizes.
“The schools that made our ranking lists for 2024 are standouts in many ways,” said Rob Franek, the Princeton Review’s editor in chief. “Their faculties are outstanding, and their programs of study have robust experiential components. Their students also receive mentoring and networking support that will serve them well into their careers.”
Also, UB leads state in NSF funding for cyberinfrastructure
“UB has more National Science Foundation grants for cyberinfrastructure research than any other college or university in New York, another sign of progress in its quest to become a top public research university.
Cyberinfrastructure includes computing systems, data storage systems, advanced information technology systems and data repositories all linked by high-speed networks that help researchers make innovations and discoveries not otherwise possible, according to the science foundation's Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure.
The OAC is the federal government’s primary vehicle for building state-of-the-art computing infrastructure at U.S. colleges and universities. UB has 12 active OAC awards totaling close to $18 million. Cornell University has the next highest number in the state with eight, while Columbia University and SUNY Stony Brook each have six.
UB’s OAC grants include $10 million awarded in April to support work at UB’s supercomputing facility, the Center for Computational Research, to develop software that monitors and measures NSF-funded cyberinfrastructure. The funding is through NSF’s highly competitive Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Coordination Ecosystem Services and Support program.
Supercomputers use many computers working together to perform billions and trillions of calculations per second to achieve data-intensive tasks like simulating the efficacy of a new drug compound or designing lighter, stronger materials for space travel.
UB’s work on the ACCESS grant involves contributions from six other institutions including Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, to develop software that academia, industry and government use to manage high-performance computing infrastructure. Hundreds of supercomputing facilities worldwide use the software to ensure their computing infrastructure runs as efficiently as possible.
UB’s research and development expenditures have risen from $353 million to $425 million a year over the past decade, a more than 20% increase, according to UB President Satish K. Tripathi. Gov. Kathy Hochul has challenged the SUNY system’s two flagships, UB and Stony Brook, to reach $1 billion in research funding by 2030.“
"U.S. News & World Report has ranked the University at Buffalo School of Nursing’s online bachelor’s degree program No. 1 nationwide.
The rankings, which evaluate online academic programs offered by U.S. schools, were released Wednesday.
“The University at Buffalo soared from a tie at No. 25 (last year) to top this year's list for bachelor's programs,” U.S. News said on its website. U.S. News ranked online bachelor’s programs for 339 schools, regardless of discipline, and the UB nursing program came out on top.
“Earning this prestigious No. 1 ranking underscores our steadfast commitment to excellence, the unwavering dedication of our faculty, the perseverance of committed students and the enduring impact of quality education in shaping the future of nursing,” said Annette Wysocki, dean of UB’s School of Nursing.
“Attaining a bachelor’s degree as a registered nurse holds profound benefits for both nurses and their patients and lowers the odds of hospital mortality by 25%,” Wysocki said.
UB’s RN to BS program gives nurses the opportunity to obtain their bachelor’s degree entirely online while continuing to care for patients in their community, she said.
UB’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences’ online master’s in engineering program also rose in the rankings. U.S. News ranked it 19th best among 109 programs in its best online master’s in engineering programs. The program was No. 29 last year and No. 49 in 2022.
“We are deeply honored by the national recognition of our engineering management program as one of the nation’s best,” said SEAS Dean Kemper Lewis. “The program’s remarkable ascent, now into the top 20, is a testament to both the dedication and ingenuity of our exceptional faculty and staff and the commitment of our outstanding students.”
Among the categories U.S. News considered for the online program rankings were engagement, services and technologies, faculty credentials and training, and peer assessment."
"U.S. News & World Report has ranked the University at Buffalo School of Nursing’s online bachelor’s degree program No. 1 nationwide.
The rankings, which evaluate online academic programs offered by U.S. schools, were released Wednesday.
“The University at Buffalo soared from a tie at No. 25 (last year) to top this year's list for bachelor's programs,” U.S. News said on its website. U.S. News ranked online bachelor’s programs for 339 schools, regardless of discipline, and the UB nursing program came out on top.
“Earning this prestigious No. 1 ranking underscores our steadfast commitment to excellence, the unwavering dedication of our faculty, the perseverance of committed students and the enduring impact of quality education in shaping the future of nursing,” said Annette Wysocki, dean of UB’s School of Nursing.
“Attaining a bachelor’s degree as a registered nurse holds profound benefits for both nurses and their patients and lowers the odds of hospital mortality by 25%,” Wysocki said.
UB’s RN to BS program gives nurses the opportunity to obtain their bachelor’s degree entirely online while continuing to care for patients in their community, she said.
UB’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences’ online master’s in engineering program also rose in the rankings. U.S. News ranked it 19th best among 109 programs in its best online master’s in engineering programs. The program was No. 29 last year and No. 49 in 2022.
“We are deeply honored by the national recognition of our engineering management program as one of the nation’s best,” said SEAS Dean Kemper Lewis. “The program’s remarkable ascent, now into the top 20, is a testament to both the dedication and ingenuity of our exceptional faculty and staff and the commitment of our outstanding students.”
Among the categories U.S. News considered for the online program rankings were engagement, services and technologies, faculty credentials and training, and peer assessment."
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