Metrics We Measure By
-
Program Appeal
-
Finances
-
Student Success
At BestCounselingDegrees.net, we focus on what benefits students the most to create our rankings. Our approach makes use of relevant, current data to review each school's overall merit, emphasizing concepts of program appeal, financing, and student success. We use data from national databases and incorporate that information into a unique formula created by our team.
Below, you can review a breakdown of our formula, which shows how we compile available data and weigh metrics that we regard as important for students assessing each particular school. By focusing on subfactors like affordability and program appeal, we uncover how specific colleges or universities can benefit individual learners.
While we do not claim our methodology is perfect, we do ensure that we focus on the most relevant data sources as we explore the most valuable factors and subfactors to students. We focus on the diversity of an institution, the percentage of students receiving financial aid, and mean earnings that graduates report, allowing counseling students to better understand the available opportunities during and after they complete their programs.
Our methodology focuses strictly on data-oriented information and remains free of editorial influence. We make use of national databases and source only the most relevant and current information to compile effective rankings. We aim for our rankings to serve as a helpful resource for potential counseling students searching for their ideal college or university.
Our Data Sources
The main data sources we use on BestCounselingDegrees.net include the most current available datasets from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). NCES is the primary source for information about universities, colleges, and technical and vocational institutions in the United States. This organization collects data on education in the country and reports findings accordingly.
As we use the data from NCES, our quality assurance team focuses on each school individually, excluding institutions missing a significant amount of data from our rankings to ensure our calculations are as accurate as possible. Our team also focuses on average net price and salary information from the US Department of Education's College Scorecard for average student earnings data.
We use strictly publicly available data in our ranking methodology, pulling information from December 2019 to create our rankings.
How We Calculate Our Rankings: A Breakdown By Ranking Type
"Best Of" Rankings
40%
Program Appeal
20%
Finances
40%
Student Success
"Most Affordable" Rankings
25%
Program Appeal
50%
Finances
25%
Student Success
"Most Accessible" Rankings
45%
Program Appeal
(Accessibility)
40%
Finances
15%
Student Success
A Look Into Our Ranking Factors
Although there is no absolute or "right" way to measure the affordability or overall quality of a school, our team chooses the factors and subfactors that we believe our students will find most relevant and important. Our student-focused methodology focuses on program appeal, finances, and student success.
While the ranking factors allow learners to understand the benefits of a particular institution, we also find it important for learners to understand more about the relevance of the subfactors we focus on. In the following section, readers can review more information about these subfactors to better understand our holistic methodology approach.