Asha and Farid Virani Hall, a 112,000-square-foot building which now stands alongside McNair Hall, offering students a combined 300,000 square-feet designed to support the school’s expanding community of graduate and undergraduate students, faculty, researchers and alumni.
Rice President Reginald DesRoches has extended Amy Dittmar’s contract as the Howard R. Hughes Provost and executive vice president for academic affairs through the 2031 fiscal year with the support of the Rice Board of Trustees.
Rice is entering a new era of growth, fueled by record student demand, an expanding faculty and research enterprise, major investments in campus infrastructure and a growing global presence — all while introducing new programs designed to ensure that a Rice education remains accessible and deeply personalized.
Rice is once again among the nation’s leading universities, earning the No. 10 spot in Niche’s 2027 Best Colleges in America rankings while placing in the top 10 across 18 academic disciplines and university categories.
Rice has once again earned national recognition in The Princeton Review’s annual Best Colleges rankings, taking the No. 1 spot in the nation for Lots of Race/Class Interaction and placing among the country’s top colleges across measures of community, value and student experience.
Rice welcomed more than 1,400 new undergraduate students to campus Sunday for the start of Orientation Week, where they were greeted by cheering students, faculty and staff across the university’s 12 residential colleges.
Rice has received a $25 million gift from university trustee James “Jim” Whitehurst and his wife, Lauren Whitehurst, to establish the Sallyport Fellows Program, a comprehensive initiative supporting first-generation and limited-income undergraduate students throughout their Rice experience.
Rice has announced a major expansion of the Rice Investment, its signature financial aid program, offering free tuition to undergraduate students from families earning up to $200,000 annually.
A gift from Rice University President’s Distinguished Fellow Ruth J. Simmons will help expand breast cancer prevention, education and outreach efforts across Southeast Texas while honoring the life of her late sister, Nora B. Wilson.
Rice's Office of Public Affairs earned four honors at the 41st Public Relations Society of America Houston Excalibur Awards, including Communications Team of the Year for the Rice News and Media Relations team.