Southwestern University is one of the nation’s best colleges for students seeking a superb education with great career preparation and at an affordable price according to The Princeton Review.

The education services company features the school in the 2016 edition of its just published book, Colleges That Pay You Back: The 200 Schools That Give You the Best Bang for Your Tuition Buck. The company also posted its school profiles for this book and the book’s seven categories of ranking lists on its website at http://www.princetonreview.com/colleges-pay-you-back.

The Princeton Review chose the schools based on ROI (return on investment) ratings it tallied for 650 schools last year. The ratings weighted 40 data points that covered everything from academics, cost, and financial aid to graduation rates, student debt, and alumni salaries and job satisfaction. The Princeton Review editors culled data from the company’s surveys of administrators and students in 2014-15 and from PayScale.com’s surveys of school alumni conducted through April 2015.

“This honor is further affirmation that our interdisciplinary curriculum and commitment to civic engagement sets our students up for an extraordinary future,” says Southwestern University’s Dean of Faculty, Alisa Gaunder, Ph.D.

“Southwestern prepares our students for lives of making meaning and making connections,” says President Edward Burger. “It is at the very core of what the University has represented for 176 years and the fact that our graduates go on to careers that are both personally and professionally rewarding is something we have known for a long time.”

“We highly recommend Southwestern University, and all of our Colleges That Pay You Back schools.  They stand out not only for their outstanding academics but also for their affordability via comparatively low sticker prices and /or generous financial aid to students with need – or both,” said Robert Franek, The Princeton Review’s Senior VP/Publisher and lead author of the book. “Students at these colleges also have access to extraordinary career services programs from their freshman year on, plus a lifetime of alumni connections and post-grad support.”

In the book’s profile of Southwestern University, The Princeton Review quotes Southwestern students who describe the university as “welcoming and personalized” and attribute their joy of learning to “wonderful” professors who clearly “love what they teach.” The “Career Information” section of the profile lists an exceptional ROI (return on investment) rating score of 89 for Southwestern. It also cites PayScale.com figures reporting Southwestern’s graduates with at least a bachelor’s degree have a median starting salary of $42,400 and median mid-career salary of $83,300.

Colleges That Pay You Back has seven categories of ranking lists.  They include a list of the “Top 50 Colleges That Pay You Back,” and six lists each naming the top 25 schools in special categories.

Southwestern University is also on the book’s lists: Best 380 Colleges, Best Western Colleges, Best Green Colleges and Best Career Services.