COOKEVILLE – With a strong Ph.D. production and a financial commitment to research, Tennessee Tech bolstered its position in the Carnegie Classification.
Tech moved up and is now celebrating its status as a R2 university — a doctoral university with high research activity. Carnegie, the national classification system for colleges and universities, classifies doctoral universities in three categories:
R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity
R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity
D/PU: Doctoral/Professional Universities
The first two categories include only institutions that award at least 20 research/scholarship doctoral degrees and have at least $5 million in total research expenditures each year. Tech had a total sponsored research amount of $16.4 million for 2017-2018.
“With the new inclusion of Ph.D. and professional doctorates, such as our Doctor of Nursing Practice, we should be in a good position to stay in classification for a long time,” said Tech President Phil Oldham.
In 2016, Tech moved from a master’s to a doctoral university in the Carnegie Classification after several years of work while placing additional emphasis on recruiting and graduating doctoral students and on original research by faculty and students in all academic areas.
The Carnegie Classification has been the leading framework for recognizing and describing institutional diversity in U.S. higher education for the past four and a half decades. Derived from empirical data on colleges and universities, the Carnegie Classification was originally published in 1973 and is reviewed and updated every five years.
The state’s only public technological university, Tennessee Tech University offers more than 40 bachelor’s and 20 graduate programs to more than 10,100 students. Tech students include outstanding high-school graduates, accomplished military veterans and students from around the world, nearly half of whom graduate debt free. With more than 200 student organizations, community service projects and intramural sports, Tennessee Tech offers a full campus experience.
