BYU named top college value

PROVO — Sticker shock brought Sahil Harlalka to Brigham Young University after just one semester at Syracuse University in New York.

Harlalka had a $10,000 scholarship at Syracuse, but still would have spent $25,000 a year on tuition and living expenses. So he looked for another, less-expensive school.

Harlalka, 22, graduated from BYU two weeks ago for less than half of what Syracuse was costing him — "$11,000 or $12,000 max a year, even including insurance and entertainment," he said. And he believes his classes were just as rigorous.

"BYU was a great value, and it wasn't just an education I got at BYU but the overall development as a person," said Harlalka, a native of Bombay, India, whose computer science degree landed him a job this week as a software developer for a Provo company.

Harlalka's experience is captured in the June issue of Consumers Digest magazine, which ranks Brigham Young University-Hawaii and BYU in Provo as the two best values among American private colleges and universities.

"We suspected there were fine schools out there under the radar screen that were excellent values," said Rich Dzierwa, managing editor of Consumers Digest.

The rankings examined 3,500 schools with a formula that balanced two factors — quality of first-time students and quality of education — with the annual cost of tuition, room and board. First-time freshmen were rated based on standardized test scores, high-school rankings and grade-point average.

The educational quality of the institutions was

measured by student-to-faculty ratio, graduation rate and percentage of faculty holding a doctorate or terminal degree.

Two of the biggest names in private higher education, Harvard University and Stanford University, did not make the top 25, though Dartmouth University was 19th.

"Stanford and Harvard are terrific schools with fabulous academics," Dzierwa said, "but Consumers Digest is all about what is the best way to spend your money."

BYU and BYU-Hawaii, based in Laie, are owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which heavily subsidizes tuition at both institutions. Several religious institutions were listed in the top 25 and Dzierwa suspected several receive money from sponsoring churches to artificially depress tuition costs.

It's money well spent, according to BYU-Hawaii spokesman Rob Wakefield.

Wakefield said BYU-Hawaii operates under a church mandate to find outstanding students in Asia and the Pacific, provide academic, moral and spiritual instruction and send them home to become church and community leaders.

BYU has been recognized in the past for being a good value. It's fifth on the 2004 Princeton Review's list of schools that provide the "Best Academic Bang for Your Buck."

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E-mail: twalch@desnews.com