For nearly 20 years, participants in UA's Berger Entrepreneurship Program in the Eller College of Business and Public Administration have regarded it as a leader among entrepreneur programs in the country.

Now they are not the only ones who think so.

Entrepreneur Magazine's April issue ranked the Berger program in its first tier, as one of the top-12 academic programs in the nation for entrepreneurs.

"Appearing in the top tier is quite an achievement," said Sherry Hoskins, associate director for the Berger Entrepreneurship Program. "But this also strengthens the other, more traditional rankings."

Entrepreneur Magazine researched more than 700 programs across the country and came up with the top 100 U.S. colleges and universities in the report, a first for the publication.

According to rankings conducted by U.S. News and World Report, UA's Eller College of Business and Public Administration is currently ranked No. 12 for undergraduates and No. 15 for graduate students. It was ranked as No. 29 in 1996.

Among the criteria examined in the Entrepreneur Magazine study were surveys sent to graduates, professors and various members of the business and academic communities. The surveys asked participants to rate areas such as faculty, offered degrees and certificates, as well as business-community outreach programs.

"Entrepreneurship education is more difficult to rank," Hoskins said. "Entrepreneurship itself has such a broad, almost infinite base of individuals and goals, that encompassing all that into one discipline is tough to do."

Although the high ranking is a first for the Berger program, it was among the first business programs for entrepreneurs when it began 19 years ago.

Undergraduate students usually take 15 credits required for the program during their final year, and graduate students complete the program sometime during their MBA study, said Joann Rockwell, program coordinator for the Berger program.

"Being around so long gives us the luxury of watching trends over the years to find out what businesses need and how they get started," Rockwell said.

Throughout the program, students create business plans for a company of their choice. During the semester, students present their plans to experts, investors and business leaders in the community, as they would if they were trying to launch their own business, Rockwell said.

Graduates of the Berger program have gone on to start over 150 companies, Rockwell said.

One of the best traits about the program, she said, is that faculty members are all practitioners. Before becoming program coordinator of the Berger program, Rockwell was the vice president for a nonprofit company and previously owned two of her own companies.

"All of our adjunct faculty are entrepreneurs and experienced business leaders," she said.

Nancy Kewin-Smith, an adjunct faculty member for the Berger program, is also president of her company, OnQ Marketing Services, which she began seven years ago.

"There's a tremendous amount of outside talent brought in to give students help," Kewin-Smith said. "We constantly have experts on panels, as judges and as faculty members, that are from the community to give people feedback."

In her year as an adjunct faculty member, Kewin-Smith said she is very impressed by the students in the program.

"(The students) have a balance of the right entrepreneur skills and a good awareness of what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur and what they need to be prepared for in the future," she said.

Last year the Berger program, which accepts 75 students a year, received about 200 applications. Hoskins expects the number of applications to rise for the highly competitive program.

"These types of rankings are a measurement of the abilities of entrepreneurship programs, and they're important to everyone," Hoskins said. "It's an indicator of the type of value you can deliver."

"(The rankings) are of great importance and very exciting for us," she said.