Graduate programs at The University of Texas at Dallas continued their upward momentum in this year’s U.S. News & World Report national rankings, with the School of Management’s full-time program leaping 10 places to No. 40 and the Engineering and Computer Science School’s programs advancing six spots to No. 70.

“It is good to be included in so many categories of these rankings. Rankings are not the only measure of quality within an institution, but they are an indication of what our peers think,” said UT Dallas President David E. Daniel. “We are quite pleased that our continuing commitment to excellence is recognized, as noted by several rankings in which we have advanced substantially since last year.”

Among the UT Dallas rankings released Tuesday in the magazine’s annual Best Graduate Schools report were:

  • Computer Engineering, No. 61 (previously unranked).
  • Electrical Engineering, No. 66 (unchanged).
  • Management Information Systems, No. 18 (up from 24).
  • Part-time MBA programs, No. 36 (up from 41).
  • School of Engineering and Computer Science, No. 70 (up from 76).
  • School of Management, No. 40 (up from 50).

Some programs are ranked less often than annually. Among those are the following UT Dallas programs that were previously ranked among the nation’s top 100:

  • Audiology, No. 4.
  • City Management and Urban Policy, No. 19.
  • Computer Science, No. 79.
  • Criminology, No. 27.
  • Earth Sciences, No. 89.
  • Physics, No. 85.
  • Political Science, No. 72.
  • Public Affairs, No. 57.
  • Speech-Language Pathology, No. 12.

This year’s rankings are based on two types of data: expert opinions about program quality and statistical indicators that measure the quality of a school’s faculty, research and students. These data come from surveys of more than 1,200 programs and some 12,400 academics and professionals that were conducted last fall.

The data will be available in the 2012 edition of the magazine’s Best Graduate Schools book, to be released April 5, 2011.