(Butler, PA) For the fifth time since 2015, Butler County Community College, serving 24,000 credit and noncredit students in eight western Pennsylvania counties and online, has been ranked as the No. 1 community college in the state.

BestColleges.com analyzed the most recent U.S. Department of Education statistics in assessing academic quality, affordability and online competency and rated BC3 atop all Pennsylvania two-year colleges for 2020, as it did in 2017. Schools.com also used U.S. Department of Education data in ranking BC3 as the No. 1 community college in Pennsylvania in 2015, 2017 and in 2019.

Each institution in BestColleges.com’s Top 15 is accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education.

“This speaks to our quality,” said Dr. Nick Neupauer, president of BC3. “Competition for students now is as fierce as it has ever been. And there’s really not much in terms of blurring the lines between all of the different sectors of higher education.

“As the parents and the students, the consumers of higher education, are looking to make decisions, this really validates not only how special we are, but the quality that we have at BC3. The fact that this is our fifth No. 1 ranking in five years is extra special. It’s a real tribute to our faculty, to our terrific students, board of trustees and (the BC3 Education) foundation that we have achieved such great success.”

It is a “high honor” to again be recognized as Pennsylvania’s No. 1 community college, said Joseph E. Kubit, chairman of BC3’s board of trustees, a BC3 graduate and BC3 distinguished alumnus.

“We are blessed to have a faculty, administration and staff who focus upon and are committed to providing our students with the highest quality and most affordable education and training possible,” Kubit said.

BestColleges.com used 2018 U.S. Department of Education information to measure academic quality by factors that include the retention rate of first-time students returning after their initial semester, and the graduation rate of full-time, first-time students within three years.

Affordability was measured by an institution’s average net price with the amount borrowed and owed after graduation; and online competency, by the percentage of students enrolled in distance education.

BC3 “the best choice I can make, college-wise”

BestColleges.com reviewed the U.S. Department of Education’s Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System and the department’s College Navigator.

Chloe Fox, 18, of Ellwood City, and a 2019 graduate of Lincoln High School, attended BC3 @ Lawrence Crossing in fall 2019 and will study for an associate degree in physical therapist assistant on BC3’s main campus this spring.“BC3 has great programs,” said Fox, whose sister, Janelle, graduated from BC3 in 2018. “It’s the best choice I can make, college-wise.”

According to the College Navigator, 60 percent of BC3’s first-time, full-time and 44 percent of BC3’s first-time, part-time students in fall 2017 returned for the spring 2018 semester. The averages among the Top 15 schools listed in BestColleges.com’s ranking was 57 percent and 48 percent.

Twenty-five percent of first-time, full-time students who began at BC3 in fall 2014 earned an associate degree within the three years considered to be 150 percent of “normal time,” the College Navigator reported. The average among the Top 15 schools listed in BestColleges.com’s ranking was 21 percent.

Students return to BC3 because of its “quality instruction and small class sizes,” said Sean Carroll, director of BC3 @ Lawrence Crossing in New Castle, one of five BC3 additional locations. BC3’s student-to-faculty ratio is 15:1, according to the College Navigator.

Chloe Fox, 18, of Ellwood City, and a 2019 graduate of Lincoln High School, returned to BC3 for the spring semester.

“BC3 has great programs,” said Fox, a BC3 @ Lawrence Crossing student in fall 2019 who will attend BC3’s main campus this spring in pursuit of an associate degree in physical therapist assistant.

“It’s the best choice I can make, college-wise.”

“I want to get the best education I can and learn the most,” said Cameron Shardy, 20, a criminology student from Transfer, Mercer County who attends BC3 @ LindenPointe in Hermitage, “before I go to the police academy.”

“Saving money is the best thing”

The U.S. Department of Education’s College Navigator determines average net price by subtracting the average amount of federal, state and local government or institutional grants, or scholarship aid, from the total cost of attendance.

According to the College Navigator, BC3’s average net price for first-time, full-time students in 2017-2018 was $3,938 and the lowest among BestColleges.com’s Top 15 Pennsylvania two-year public and private schools, whose average was $10,792.

The College Navigator also reported that 26 percent of BC3’s first-time, full-time students in 2017-18 received a federal or other student loan that averaged $4,527. BC3’s percentage of first-time, full-time students borrowing was the second-lowest among the Top 15 two-year schools, as was the amount borrowed.

The average student loan debt for the Class of 2018 is $35,510 in Pennsylvania, according to an Aug. 8 report from LendEDU, a website that provides comparisons for loans, credit cards and other financial products. Two-thirds of graduates from Pennsylvania institutions have student-loan debt, LendEDU reported.

The BC3 Education Foundation awards more than $200,000 in scholarships annually.

Seventy percent of BC3 graduates are debt-free.

Cameron Shardy, 20, of Transfer, Mercer County, and a 2017 graduate of Reynolds High School in Greenville, enrolled at BC3 @ LindenPointe in Hermitage in fall 2019 and returned this spring in pursuit of an associate degree in criminology and career in law enforcement. “I want to get the best education I can and learn the most before I go to the police academy.”

BC3’s affordability is attractive to students, Carroll said, “especially if they are looking to transfer. The savings in years one and two can be used toward the much higher costs of four-year institutions.”

Tuition and fees for BC3 students from Lawrence and Mercer counties pursuing 15 credits per semester for one year in the 2019-2020 academic year are $8,100. Annual savings for BC3 students from Lawrence and Mercer counties attending BC3 range from $3,194 compared to Pennsylvania’s public four-year institutions and $28,701 compared to Pennsylvania’s private institutions.

Fox plans to graduate debt-free from BC3 as did her sister, Janelle, who earned an associate degree in early childhood education in 2018 and was among the BC3’s three most recent largest graduating classes of the century.

“Money-wise,” Fox said, “I don’t want to be in a lot of debt.”

Added John Suesser, director of BC3 @ LindenPointe: “Students can truly afford a start their higher education without acquiring an over-burdening debt structure.”

Shardy, a 2017 graduate of Reynolds High School in Greenville, enrolled at BC3 @ LindenPointe in the fall and returned this spring in pursuit of an associate degree and career in law enforcement.

“Saving money,” Shardy said, “is the best thing. You don’t have to have $50,000 in student loans when you come out.”

According to the U.S. Department of Education’s 2018 College Scorecard, BC3’s salary-to-cost ratio, a measurement of graduates’ salaries 10 years after commencement for every dollar a student pays to attend the institution, was 7.45 and the highest among 43 colleges and universities in western Pennsylvania.

“Students in most cases are able to complete a two-year degree and leave with little to zero debt,” said Lauren Buchanan, director of BC3 @ Cranberry in Cranberry Township, Butler County. “Students don’t want to start their first job having a larger debt to salary ratio.”

BC3’s top ratio was most closely followed by West Virginia University at 4.79. The highest salary-to-cost ratio among five regional Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education universities was 2.61; and among the 21 private institutions, 2.81.

40% of BC3 students this spring taking an online course

BestColleges.com considered the percentage of students enrolled in online classes as an indicator of a college’s investment in distance education.

Twenty-four percent of BC3 students in fall 2018 took at least one online course, and 4 percent took only an online course or only online courses, according to the College Navigator. The averages among the Top 15 schools listed in BestColleges.com’s ranking was 20 percent and 9 percent.

Nearly 40 percent of BC3 students are registered to take at least one online BC3 course this spring as of Jan. 13, according to Sharla Anke, BC3’s assistant dean of institutional research, and 10 percent are taking only an online course or only online courses.

BC3 will offer in a spring 2020 semester that began Monday 66 online, 15 hybrid and four iTV courses, according to Ann McCandless, BC3’s dean of educational technology. Hybrid course are online classes that require at least four campus meetings. iTV courses are those in which an instructor’s in-class lesson is delivered to separate classrooms simultaneously through various technology.

The first of BC3’s three spring semester five-week online Fast Track sessions, which debuted in 2016, also began Monday.

“The variety of class times, including evenings, online and hybrid courses, allow greater flexibility for our students,” Carroll said, “the majority of whom work and have varied family responsibilities.”

Students in 49 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands can take BC3’s online courses.

Following BC3 in the BestColleges.Com ranking were, No. 2, Bucks County Community College, Newtown; No. 3, Montgomery County Community College, Blue Bell; No. 4, Northampton County Area Community College, Bethlehem; No. 5, Pennsylvania Highlands Community College, Johnstown; No. 6, Lehigh Carbon Community College, Schnecksville; No. 7; Mercyhurst University North East; No. 8, Community College of Beaver County, Monaca; No. 9, Luzerne County Community College, Nanticoke; No. 10, Delaware County Community College, Media; No. 11, Community College of Allegheny County, Pittsburgh; No. 12, Manor College, Jenkintown; No. 13, the University of Pittsburgh at Titusville; No. 14, Harcum College, Bryn Mawr; and No. 15, Reading Area Community College, Reading.