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The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley kicks off its 10th anniversary by being ranked seventh nationally and first in Texas for tuition and tax dollars in Washington Monthly’s 2025 College Guide, which ranks institutions’ commitment to affordability, access and student outcomes.

The ranking focuses on how colleges mobilize talent and resources for keeping education affordable, expanding access, has students graduating into strong outcomes and for community services.

The top rank in Texas marks the third time UTRGV has earned the position.

University President Guy Bailey said he couldn’t be prouder of the ranking and its stamp of approval on everything the school was set out to do a decade ago.

“Washington Monthly has the same kind of values we do about higher education,” Bailey said. “We’re not particularly worried about prestige … What we are worried about is value, and value is a combination of quality. So that means offering great programs, having wonderful faculty teaching those programs, getting a first-rate education, and price”

According to the UTRGV website, undergraduate Texas residents who are full-time students or take 12 hours in the fall or spring of this school year pay $4,996 while graduate students pay $5,682. Undergraduate non-residents pay $9,856 and graduates pay $10,542.

“There’s nothing generic about (UTRGV),” Washington Monthly stated. “Its programs reflect the needs of the borderlands. And its students, overwhelmingly local, are reshaping what public higher education can look like when built with — and for — a community. UTRGV is redefining what a regional public university can do.”

UTRGV is the only Texas university on the list’s top 30 and is among colleges such as Princeton University, Cal State LA and Florida International University.

Some of the metrics taken into consideration are what students pay, graduation and retention rates, and student performance.

Bailey said UTRGV has kept its tuition low since the university has a different financial model. He said the internal rule is for tuition to never go above the total of a Pell Grant and a Texas grant.

“We structured the university around the revenue we get from that, and it’s quite a bit of quite a bit of revenue,” he said. “So what that means is that two-thirds of our students who are Pell Grant students are going to go, you know, probably pay no tuition, mandatory fees at all. But we’re at 91%, that’s a lot higher than two-thirds.”

UTRGV was also ranked the second best Hispanic Serving institution, with about 94% of students being Hispanic.

“We’re extremely proud of (that) and the reason that’s important to us is, it’s because of the community we serve,” he said. “Somebody asked me, ‘What do you do for Hispanic students?’ Well, we just do what we do for all of our students.”

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