Communication & Media Studies is of the hottest bachelor's degree programs in the United States, coming in as the #5 most popular major in the country. So, there are lots of possibilities to explore when you're trying to determine where you want to get your degree.
In 2025, College Factual analyzed 89 schools in order to identify the top ones for its Best Communication & Media Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 6,366 bachelor's degrees in communication & media studies during the 2022-2023 academic year.
Choosing a Great Communication & Media Studies School for Your Bachelor's Degree
Your choice of communication & media studies for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
Overall Quality Is a Must
The overall quality of a bachelor's degree school is important to ensure a good education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To take this into account we consider a college's overall Best Colleges ranking which itself looks at a collection of various factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
Average Early-Career Salaries
Average early-career salary of those graduating with their bachelor's degree is one indicator we use in our analysis to find the schools that offer the highest-quality education. After all, your bachelor's degree won't mean much if it doesn't help you find a job that will help you earn a living.
Other Factors We Consider
The metrics below are just some of the other metrics that we use to determine our rankings.
Major Focus - How much a school focuses on communication & media studies students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other communication & media studies students want to attend this school to pursue a bachelor's degree.
Educational Resources - How many resources are allocated to students. These resources may include educational expenditures per student, number of students per instructor, and graduation rate among other things.
Student Debt - How much debt communication & media studies students go into to obtain their bachelor's degree and how well they are able to pay back that debt.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized communication & media studies related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for communication & media studies students working on their bachelor's degree.
The communications school you choose to invest your time and money in matters. To help you make the decision that is right for you, we've developed a number of major-specific rankings, including this list of the Best Communication & Media Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region.
To further help you make the college decision, we've developed a unique tool called College Combat that allows you to compare schools based on the factors that matter the most to you.
Go ahead and give it a try, or bookmark the link so you can check it out later.
Best Schools for Bachelor’s Students to Study Communication & Media Studies in the Great Lakes Region
The following list ranks the best colleges and universities for pursuing a bachelor's degree in communication & media studies. Only those schools that rank in the top 20% of all the schools we analyze get awarded with a place on this list.
17 Top Great Lakes Region Schools for a Bachelor's in Communications
Northwestern University is a good choice for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in communication & media studies. Located in the small city of Evanston, Northwestern is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population.
Those communication & media studies students who get their bachelor's degree from Northwestern University receive $16,215 more than the average communications grad.
It's difficult to beat University of Michigan - Ann Arbor if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in communication & media studies. Located in the city of Ann Arbor, U-M is a public university with a very large student population.
Those communication & media studies students who get their bachelor's degree from University of Michigan - Ann Arbor make $14,561 more than the standard communications student.
It's hard to beat Michigan State University if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in communication & media studies. Michigan State is a very large public university located in the small city of East Lansing.
Bachelor's graduates who receive their degree from the communications program make around $36,390 in their early career salary.
Every student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in communication & media studies needs to look into University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. UIUC is a very large public university located in the city of Champaign.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the communications program report average early career wages of $37,808.
Located in the large city of Columbus, Ohio State is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Communication & Media Studies bachelor's degree recipients from Ohio State University - Main Campus get an earnings boost of about $5,237 above the average earnings of communication & media studies graduates.
Located in the city of West Lafayette, Purdue is a public university with a very large student population.
Bachelor's recipients from the communication & media studies major at Purdue University - Main Campus make $5,414 more than the typical graduate in this field when they enter the workforce.
Located in the large city of Cincinnati, UC is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Those communication & media studies students who get their bachelor's degree from University of Cincinnati - Main Campus receive $5,143 more than the typical communications graduate.
Located in the medium-sized city of Dayton, UDayton is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Those communication & media studies students who get their bachelor's degree from University of Dayton make $6,634 more than the standard communications student.
Illinois State is a fairly large public university located in the medium-sized suburb of Normal.
Bachelor's recipients from the communication & media studies program at Illinois State University get $2,130 above the average graduate with the same degree shortly after graduation.
Located in the town of Whitewater, UW - Whitewater is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Those communication & media studies students who get their bachelor's degree from University of Wisconsin - Whitewater earn $3,372 more than the average communications grad.
UWM is a fairly large public university located in the large city of Milwaukee.
Bachelor's recipients from the communication & media studies program at University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee earn $2,045 more than the typical graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
Rest of the Top Best Communication & Media Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region
Honorable Mentions
These are some additional schools worth mentioning that are also great but just didn't quite make the cut to earn our top Best Communication & Media Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region award.
The bars on the spread charts above show the distribution of the schools on this list +/- one standard deviation from the mean.
The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a branch of the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) serves as the core of the rest of our data about colleges.
Some other college data, including much of the graduate earnings data, comes from the U.S. Department of Education’s (College Scorecard).
Your choice of communication & media studies for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
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