Saint Michael's College

What Others Are Saying...

Listed below are some of Saint Michael’s many recognitions of the past five years by unbiased, outside sources, through rankings, grants or awards. 



Saint Michael's appears in the 2007 edition of The Princeton Review's Best 361 Colleges guidebook.

Saint Michael’s, after a three-year review, joined the elite group of 270 colleges nationwide with Phi Beta Kappa chapters, making Saint Michael’s one of 20 national Catholic colleges with a chapter and one of four in New England (Saint Michael’s, Holy Cross, Boston College and Fairfield).

Newsweek/Kaplan named Saint Michael’s College one of 30 colleges deemed a “Hidden Treasure” on the basis of information from Kaplan’s National Guidance Counselor Survey.  “Hidden Treasures” were colleges recommended most frequently as being “small schools that deserve national recognition.”

U.S. News & World Report, August 2007, “America’s Best Colleges:  2008 Annual Guide,” lists Saint Michael’s for the first time in the "Best National Liberal Arts Colleges" category, with a ranking of #106, sharing that position with nine other institutions including Stonehill College, Bennington College and Washington & Jefferson.

In June 2003 Saint Michael’s was selected to appear in a new admissions guidebook and Web site called Colleges of Distinction, which profiles 150 colleges throughout the United States that “excel in engaging students, offering great teaching, providing a vibrant campus community and resulting in successful outcomes for their students.”


Dr. David Mindich, professor of journalism and mass communications, was named the 2006 Vermont Professor of the Year by the Washington, DC, based Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Council for Advancement and Support of Higher Education. This marks the fourth Saint Michael’s professor in seven years to be so honored: Frank Nicosia (history) in 2000; Adrie Kusserow (anthropology) in 2002; Patricia Siplon (political science) in 2003.


In October 2006, Saint Michael’s Web site earned an “A” rating from the National Research Center for College University Admissions (NRCCUA). Of over 3,000 surveyed, only 157 college and university Web sites earned an “A” grade, Saint Michael’s among them. That puts Saint Michael's in the top 5% of all college Web sites.

Saint Michael’s senior political science major and global studies minor, Jamila Headley of Barbados, is named one of 32 scholars nationwide to earn a coveted 2006 Rhodes Scholarship to the University of Oxford. She will pursue two master’s programs starting in October 2007, the first in Global Health Policy and the second in International Development.

Junior political science major and global studies and international business minor Michele Kayser of Essex Junction, Vt., is named one of only 19 Pickering Undergraduate Fellows nationwide for 2006. She received the Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Fellowship of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation propelling her to a career in the United States diplomatic service.

Poet/professor Greg Delanty was awarded a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship in March 2007.  According to the Guggenheim Web site, fellowships are awarded to men and women who have "already demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts." Professor Delanty plans to use the fellowship to work on a book of poetry to be titled The Greek Anthology Book XVII.

Saint Michael's College assistant professor of religious studies, Dr. Donna Freitas has been invited to join a Newsweek/Washington Post panel of distinguished theologians, professors and commentators including Madeleine Albright, Desmond Tutu, Elie Wiesel and others, to participate in online conversations, titled “On Faith.”

The Fulbright Program named Saint Michael's College professor of history Dr. Frank Nicosia a Fulbright Scholar on Nazi Germany and the Middle East, 1933-1944, at Humboldt University of Berlin in Germany. Previously, associate professor of political science Dr. Patricia Siplon earned a Fulbright to do research on gender inequity and AIDS in Tanzania at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. Dr. Jack MacDonald, professor of English, earned a Fulbright to teach at Vietnam National University in Hanoi in 2001. Canada-U.S. Fulbright Program, named associate professor of political science Dr. Jeffrey Ayres in 2004 as the first professor to fill the Fulbright-Carleton University Chair in North American Studies at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada.

The U.S. Department of Education, Office of English Acquisition awarded the Saint Michael's College School of International Studies a $713,000 grant to be used over five years to train public school teachers of children throughout Vermont needing English language education. 

The National Institutes of Health fund for the Vermont Genetics Network awarded over $500,000 to Saint Michael's College scientists in 2005 for five research projects, laboratory improvements and administrative costs.

The New England Historical Association elected Dr. George Dameron, Saint Michael's College Professor of History, vice president for 2005-06, making him president for 2006-07.

Vermont Women in Higher Education named Saint Michael’s director of community relations Marilyn Cormier 2006 winner of the Sister Elizabeth Candon Distinguished Service Award. Saint Michael's College Women’s Center Director Kim Swartz won the Peggy R. Williams Emerging Professional Award from the same organization in 2005 and Saint Michael's College Director of Marketing Anne Conaway-Peters won the Emerging Professional award in 2004.

The Lake Champlain Research Consortium, including Saint Michael's College, Middlebury, UVM, Johnson, Plattsburgh, Castleton and Green Mountain, named Saint Michael's College professor of biology, Dr. Doug Facey, executive director of the consortium.

The U.S. Agency for International Development awarded Saint Michael’s College and LakeNet a $500,000 grant titled “Towards a World Lake Basin Management Initiative: Documenting Lessons Learned, Sharing Experience and Providing Technical Assistance.”

The National Science Foundation awarded Saint Michael’s College a $200,000 grant from their CSEMS (computer science, engineering and math scholarships) program in August 2001 to fund undergraduate scholarships.  Saint Michael’s was granted the award at the maximum award level of $200,000, which, according to NSF, is a rarity.

The Vermont Chamber of Commerce, on May 23, 2001, named Saint Michael’s College the 2001 Exporter of the Year for making significant contributions to “Vermont’s international trade stature through competing with hard work, innovation and vision in the global marketplace” by the Saint Michael’s School for International Students.

The Pew Charitable Trust and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, in November 2000, named Saint Michael’s College one of 34 exemplary institutions in the NSSE, National Survey of Student Engagement: The College Student Report.