DePaul University’s emphasis on community-based service learning has been singled out as one of 25 top service-learning programs in the nation by U.S.News & World Report, which cited it in the “Programs to Look For” section of the magazine’s “America’s Best Colleges 2009” edition. The publication sought out “schools with outstanding examples of academic programs that are believed to lead to student success,” and then invited college presidents, chief academic officers and deans of students from over 1,300 colleges and universities to name 10 institutions that were the best examples of each program type.

But that’s not all. The “Fiske Guide to Colleges 2009” praised DePaul as “the best Roman Catholic university in Chicago” and lauded the campus environment, noting that “DePaul’s Lincoln Park setting is like New York’s Greenwich Village without the headaches.” 

“DePaul is attracting accolades from a broad spectrum of sources, including national general interest and business magazines, higher education industry trade publications and, most importantly, our students and the employers who are seeking to hire them,” said the Rev. Dennis H. Holtschneider, C.M, DePaul’s president. “We’ve set out to become one of the finest urban Catholic universities in the United States, and the public has noticed.”

Caryn Chaden, associate vice president for Academic Affairs, says DePaul’s emphasis on engaging students in learning outside the classroom is one of the university’s core educational philosophies. “In community-based service learning courses, students see concepts they’ve learned in class play out in real-life situations, reflect on differences between theory and practice, and engage deeply with community partners.  It’s a distinctive quality of DePaul students’ academic experience,” she said.

U.S. News wrote, “In service learning programs, required (or for-credit) volunteer work in the community is an instructional strategy. What’s learned in the field bolsters what happens in class and vice versa.”   

This is the sixth consecutive year that U.S. News has ranked DePaul’s service learning program among the nation’s Top 25. DePaul is the only university in Illinois honored in the service learning category.

Last month, DePaul was ranked No. 1 in the nation in the “Great College Town” category and No. 10 in the nation in the “Diverse Student Population” category by the Princeton Review.

With an enrollment of 23,401 students on two city and four suburban campuses, DePaul is the largest Catholic university in the nation and the largest private, not-for-profit university in the Midwest. DePaul is an innovative and diverse university offering pragmatic educational programs that instill values, including a commitment to community service.