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CollegeNET ranks WSSU No. 2 in the nation for being a social mobility innovator

Technology provider CollegeNET ranks Winston-Salem State University (WSSU) No. 2 in the United States for being a driver of social mobility for its students.

Social mobility, as defined by CollegeNET, involves delivering a high-quality college education at an affordable price to create opportunities for students to move from one socioeconomic class to another.

The 2023 Social Mobility Index (SMI) examined 1,198 four-year colleges and universities in the U.S. according to how they “hold the line on tuition, enroll students from low-income backgrounds, graduate their students into good paying jobs, and apply their promotional messaging towards solving our nation’s social mobility problem.”

The SMI pulls data from sources including the US Dept of Education’s College Scorecard and IPEDS to measure the extent to which a college or university educates economically-disadvantaged students (with family incomes below the national median) at lower tuition and graduates them into well-paying jobs.

The CollegeNET SMI ranking comes after WSSU placed No. 1 in North Carolina for social mobility by U.S. News & World Report and No. 1 for economic mobility in NC by the New York Times. WSSU was also ranked the No. 1 HBCU in the Southeast for “Best Bang for the Buck” by Washington Monthly magazine and as one of the Best Colleges in America by Money magazine.

 

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