a bachelor's degree in materials engineering is more popular than many other degrees. In fact, it ranks #145 out of 363 on popularity of all such degrees in the nation. So, you have a fair amount of options to choose from when looking for a school.
College Factual looked at 3 colleges and universities when compiling its 2025 Best Materials Engineering Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Plains States Region ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 82 bachelor's degrees in materials engineering during the 2022-2023 academic year.
Choosing a Great Materials Engineering School for Your Bachelor's Degree
Your choice of materials engineering 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
A school that excels in educating for a particular major and degree level must be a great school overall as well. To make it into this list a school must rank well in our overall Best Colleges ranking. This ranking considered factors such as graduation rates, overall graduate earnings and other educational resources to identify great colleges and universities.
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
In addition to the above, you should consider some of the following factors:
Major Focus - How much a school focuses on materials engineering students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - The number of materials engineering students who choose to seek a bachelor's degree at the school.
Educational Resources - The amount of money and other resources allocated to students while they are pursuing their degree. These resources include such things as number of students per instructor and education expenditures per student.
Student Debt - How easy is it for materials engineering to pay back their student loans after receiving their bachelor's degree.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized materials engineering related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for materials engineering students working on their bachelor's degree.
The materials engineering 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 Materials Engineering Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Plains States 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 Materials Engineering in the Plains States Region
Below you'll see a list of the best colleges and universities for pursuing a bachelor's degree in materials engineering.
Top Plains States Region Schools for a Bachelor's in Materials Engineering
University of Minnesota - Twin Cities is a wonderful option for students pursuing a bachelor's degree in materials engineering. Located in the city of Minneapolis, UMN Twin Cities is a public university with a fairly large student population.
After graduating, materials engineering bachelor's recipients usually earn an average of $60,445 in their early careers.
It is difficult to beat Iowa State University if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in materials engineering. Located in the small city of Ames, Iowa State is a public university with a very large student population.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the materials engineering program report average early career income of $65,831.
Winona State University is one of the best schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in materials engineering. Winona State is a medium-sized public university located in the distant town of Winona.
Materials Engineering bachelor's degree recipients from Winona State University get an earnings boost of approximately $6,537 over the typical earnings of materials engineering majors.
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 materials engineering 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:
