The WVU Division of Arts master of fine arts program is ranked number 61 among the best fine arts programs in the country, according to the U.S. News&World Reports latest edition of Americas Best Graduate Schools 2004.

The publication, which came out in early April, ranked 137 of the nations more than 200 fine arts programs. The WVU ranking places it ahead of programs such as the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York, the State University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook, Northwestern University, the New York Academy of Art, and many other major universities and art schools.

The WVU Division of Art was among a group of schools that received a 3.0, including Boston University, Florida State University, Stanford University, Pennsylvania State University, Maine College of Art and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The top three schools received a 4.4 score out of 5.0.

“I am so very pleased that the Division of Arts graduate program has joined a prestigious group of nationally ranked programs at West Virginia University,”said College of Creative Arts Dean Bernie Schultz.”This significant achievement is the result of a hard-working and professionally involved faculty, a visionary chairperson in Sergio Soave, the courage to advance curricular reform, and a driving will to upgrade the program for the sake of our students. The achievement is all the more remarkable as it occurred during a time of burgeoning undergraduate enrollment in the Division.”

“We are very proud of our graduate programs in visual art and have always felt they were deserving of wider recognition,”Chair of Art Sergio Soave said.”Alumni from this program have gone on to be leaders in their fields. The art faculty is a talented group of artists and scholars who are professionally engaged in their fields and believe in a team-oriented approach to graduate education.

“The recent ranking by U.S. News&World Report recognizes the commitment of faculty to graduate teaching, the quality of faculty and graduate student research, the highly competitive and selective nature of the program, and the comprehensive preparation the curriculum provides,”Soave said.

He said that in recent years, the WVU Master of Fine Art program has undergone major revisions, transforming the curriculum into a three-year course of study that encourages creative investigations across disciplines and promotes the study of related courses from across the campus.

The Master of Fine Art program includes the study of painting, printmaking, ceramics, sculpture, graphic de sign and intermedia.

U.S. News&World Report ranking is based solely on the results of a peer assessment survey. It allows students to compare attributes of various programs, acceptance rates, test scores of entering students, and student body demographics, among other things. The current ranking was computed in January 2003, based on data from a survey sent out in the fall of the previous year.

U.S. News first published a reputation-only graduate school ranking in 1987. The annual Americas Best Graduate Schools report began in 1990.

The WVU School of Musics graduate program in music education has also consistently made the U.S. News&World Report list. Other WVU programs that made the list this year include the College of Law, the Universitys clinical psychology program and the School of Nursing.