UNC Asheville Featured in Fiske Guide to Colleges 2024

UNC Asheville is a featured university in the Fiske Guide to Colleges 2024, a publication highlighting more than 300 of the “best and most interesting” colleges in the U.S., Canada, and UK.

According to the Fiske Guide, “all the ingredients for a superior college experience lie in wait at Asheville: strong academics, dedicated professors, and an administration that continues to push for excellence. It’s a place to get the kind of liberal arts education usually associated with private colleges—but at the cost of a public university.”

These same experiences garner appreciation from students.

As one UNC Asheville senior student said in the Fiske Guide, “Everyone who works here is dedicated to the student experience in some way…. That means you won’t be a number.”

UNC Asheville’s entry in the Fiske Guide highlights the University’s emphasis on academic excellence and engagement, commending the various academic programs on campus.

“Research is indeed a key emphasis here: Asheville founded the National Conference on Undergraduate Research and has hosted the conference five times. About 60 percent of Asheville students will have an undergraduate research experience by graduation. The UNC Asheville honors program offers special courses—as well as cultural and social opportunities—to motivated students who can make the grade.”

Along with academics, the Fiske Guide remarked on the vibrant and open culture at UNC Asheville and its surrounding town, noting all the adventures students have access to, such as the national forests and parks that border the school, and the diverse city-life of Asheville.

“We encourage everyone to be themselves and pursue their own interests,” said a psychology major in the Fiske Guide.

The Fiske Guide continues to expand on the university’s student community. “The campus is home to a strong LGBTQ community, and a substantial number of transfer students add their own brand of diversity. Students tend to be progressively minded, and issues of environmental sustainability and racial and gender equity get particular attention on campus.”

Students interested in pursuing their undergraduate education at North Carolina’s premier public liberal arts and sciences university can learn more at https://www.unca.edu/admission/why-unc-asheville/.