As a leading research university with a distinctive commitment to undergraduate education, rice university aspires to path breaking research, unsurpassed teaching, and contributions to the betterment of our world. It seeks to fulfill this mission by cultivating a diverse community of learning and discovery that produces leaders across the spectrum of human endeavor. The university enrolls approximately 4,000 undergraduate and 3,000 graduate students. Approximately 70% of undergraduate students receive financial aid, as do almost all doctoral students.

Education , Universities

Departmental research and instruction, and other institutional activities. Rice university is accredited by the southern association of colleges and schools commission on colleges (sacs-coc), accreditation board for engineering and technology (abet), international association for management education (aacsb international), national architectural accrediting board (naab), and the texas education agency (tea). Rice serves approximately 4,000 undergraduate and 3,000 graduate students, as well as 13,000 life-long learners. For the cohort entering fall 2011 the six-year undergraduate graduation rate is 91 percent. Rice offers more than 50 undergraduate majors across six schools of study: social sciences, natural sciences, engineering, humanities, music and architecture. In conjunction with various majors, students can take courses that satisfy the requirements for admission to medical, dental, law or graduate school, or that lead to teacher certification. In 2017, the jones school of business announced plans to launce an online mba program. Rice university has an undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio of 6 to 1. In general, classes are small enough for each professor to know every student's name, so there is ample opportunity for personal attention. Rice is ranked among the top 20 nationally by the us news and world report in the 2018 edition, and the princeton review ranked rice no. 1 for "happiest students" and "lots of race/class interactions" in the 2018 edition, along with high rankings for "best quality of life" and "best health services". In kiplinger's "300 best college values for 2018," rice ranks no. 5 among private universities and no. 8 among private and public schools combined. Rice offers advanced degrees in the humanities, liberal studies, social sciences, natural sciences, engineering, architecture, music, and business. Graduate programs are small to medium-sized, offering the opportunity to work very closely with graduate advisors. Proximity to both the houston museum district and the renowned texas medical center allows for exceptional access to the visual arts as well as cutting-edge biomedical research. The many interdisciplinary centers and institutes enhance the experience of students across all disciplines. Rice's moody center for the arts opened in february 2017. It offers an experimental platform for creating and presenting works in all disciplines, a flexible teaching space to encourage new modes of learning and a forum for creative partnerships with visiting national and international artists. Open and accessible to the public, the moody is dedicated to transdisciplinary collaboration in the arts, sciences and humanities. The rice music and performing arts center is currently under construction. The music and opera building is expected to be open to students and the general public in july 2020. The susanne m. Glasscock school of continuing studies provides lifelong personal and professional development opportunities to the larger community. The school attracts more than 16,000 enrollments each year to its non-credit and credit programs. Rice is located in houston, texas, the nation's fourth-largest city, the energy capital of the world and a dynamic international business and cultural center, on a 300-acre, tree-lined campus just a few miles from downtown. Undergraduate students are given free metro passes for public transportation; including the light rail system which has two stations located a block from campus. The university operates a free shuttle bus route that includes the campus, off-campus graduate student housing, and local shopping centers and attractions. Houston boasts 189 museums, opera, ballet, symphony and theater, and four professional major league sports teams. Rice's residential college system lies at the core of every undergraduate's experience. Every undergraduate student, whether living on campus or not, is a member of one of 11 self-governed coeducational residential col