2025 Best Respiratory Care Therapy Associate Degree Schools in the Plains States Region
21
Colleges in the Plains States Region
331
Associate Degrees
If you pursue a associate degree in
respiratory care therapy, you won't be alone. The field of study is the #31 most popular program in the country. This makes choosing the right school a hard decision.
In 2025, College Factual analyzed 21 schools in order to identify the top ones for its Best Respiratory Care Therapy Associate Degree Schools in the Plains States Region ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 331 associate degrees in respiratory care therapy during the 2022-2023 academic year.
What's on this page: * Our Methodology
Choosing a Great Respiratory Care Therapy School for Your Associate Degree
Your choice of respiratory care therapy for getting your associate degree school matters. Important measures of a quality respiratory care therapy/therapist program can vary widely even among the top schools. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
Quality Overall Is Important
A school that excels in educating for a particular major and degree level must be a great school overall as well. To take this into account we include a college's overall Best Colleges ranking which itself looks at a combination of different factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
Other Factors We Consider
The metrics below are just some of the other metrics that we use to determine our rankings.
- Major Focus - How many resources a school devotes to respiratory care therapy students as compared to other majors.
- Major Demand - The number of respiratory care therapy students who choose to seek a associate degree at the school.
- 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.
- Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized respiratory care therapy related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for respiratory care therapy students working on their associate degree.
One Size Does Not Fit All
Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we've developed the Best Respiratory Care Therapy Associate Degree Schools in the Plains States Region ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.