Bluffton University is in the top tier of "regional colleges" in the Midwest, according to U.S. News & World Report.

The 2012 edition of the magazine's Best Colleges guidebook ranks Bluffton 25th among 97 comparable Midwestern institutions in the "Best Regional Colleges" listing. Bluffton has now made the U.S. News rankings 14 consecutive years.

"Bluffton has been listed year after year as a top-tier regional college," said Dr. Eric Fulcomer, vice president for enrollment management and student life. "This speaks to the high-quality academic program and out-of-classroom experience that we offer our students."

Regional colleges are defined as institutions that focus almost entirely on the undergraduate experience and offer a broad range of programs in the liberal arts-though those programs account for fewer than half of all bachelor's degrees awarded-and in fields such as business, nursing and education.

For the magazine's purposes, the Midwest encompasses 12 states, from Ohio west to the Dakotas, Nebraska and Kansas.

The annual college guide uses seven indicators to determine quality, including assessment by administrators at peer institutions, student retention, faculty resources, student selectivity, financial resources, alumni giving and-for national universities and national liberal arts colleges-"graduation rate performance," meaning the difference between the proportion of students expected to graduate and the proportion who actually do.