Bridgewater College stands out as one of the best colleges in the Southeast, according to The Princeton Review. The education services company lists Bridgewater as one of 143 colleges in the Best of the Southeast section of its “2022 Best Colleges: Region by Region” website feature. The list names 654 schools in five zones—the Northeast, the Southeast, the Midwest, the West and international—as the best in each region. The lists are alphabetized and unranked.
The featured colleges are a select group of places of higher learning, as they constitute just 24% of the nation’s 2,700 four-year colleges. The schools were chosen primarily for their academics, and each one also received ratings from 60 to 99 in six categories based on institutional data and student experience surveys.
Bridgewater College ranked highest in the categories of fire safety (a near perfect 97), professor accessibility (92) and quality of life (92). Fire safety measures how well a school is prepared to prevent or respond to campus fires, including sprinkler systems in student housing. Professor accessibility is based on student survey feedback on how accessible instructors are outside of the classroom. With a 13:1 student-to-faculty ratio and an average class size of 19 students, Bridgewater College professors are known for going the extra mile for their students and forming close relationships that last far beyond a student’s time on campus.
Quality of life is a measure of how happy students are with their lives outside of the classroom. In this category, students assess their overall happiness; the beauty, safety and location of campus; the comfort of student housing; the quality of food on campus; the ease of navigating campus; the friendliness of their fellow students; the interaction of different student types; and the quality of the school’s relationship with the local community.
On campus, the College offers more than 60 student-run clubs that provide opportunities for connections among diverse groups of students outside of the classroom, and a third of BC students are members of one of the College’s Division III athletic teams.
Off campus, the town of Bridgewater, Va., provides the perfect backdrop for collegiate life as it consistently ranks as one of the safest towns in the state.
“The fact that the Princeton Review rankings stem from multiple sources, including actual student satisfaction reviews, really speaks volumes to BC’s commitment to an academically excellent, safe and fun community,” said Bridgewater College Vice President of Enrollment Management Michael Post. “This recognition matters to many prospective families because it shows our ability to provide their students support during college as well as their preparation for the future.”
