2025 Best Optometry Schools in the Great Lakes Region
3Colleges in the Great Lakes Region
355Optometry Degrees Awarded
$102,063Avg Early-Career Salary
Optometry isn't the most popular major in the world, but it's not the least popular either. To be more precise it ranks #194 in popularity out of 395 majors in the country. As such, the degree program isn't offered at every college in the United States, but there are schools that do have a program in the field that are top-notch when it comes to quality.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 3 schools in the Great Lakes Region to determine which ones were the best for optometry students pursuing a degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 355 degrees in optometry annually.
Your choice of optometry school matters, so we have put together these rankings to help you make your decision. We derive our Best Overall Optometry School rankings by rolling up our degree-level rankings after weighting them by the number of degrees awarded at each school.
You may want to choose one of the degree levels below to find the schools of most interest to you.
Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we've developed the Best Optometry Schools in the Great Lakes Region ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.
You can also filter this list by location to find schools closer to you.
In addition to College Factual's rankings, you may want to take a look at College Combat, our unique tool that lets you pit your favorite schools head-to-head and compare how they rate on factors that most interest you.
When you have some time, check it out - you may want to bookmark the link so you don't forget it.
Best Schools for Optometry in the Great Lakes Region
Although we recommend filtering by degree level first, you can view the list below to see which schools give the educational experience for the optometry degree levels they offer.
Indiana University - Bloomington is one of the best schools in the country for getting a degree in optometry. IU Bloomington is a fairly large public university located in the city of Bloomington. A Best Colleges rank of #30 out of 2,152 colleges nationwide means IU Bloomington is a great university overall.
There were roughly 70 optometry students who graduated with this degree at IU Bloomington in the most recent year we have data available. Degree recipients from the optometry major at Indiana University - Bloomington make $7,299 more than the typical graduate in this field when they enter the workforce.
It's hard to beat Ohio State University - Main Campus if you want to pursue a degree in optometry. Ohio State is a fairly large public university located in the large city of Columbus. This university ranks 1st out of 91 schools for overall quality in the state of Ohio.
There were approximately 68 optometry students who graduated with this degree at Ohio State in the most recent year we have data available. Students who graduate with their degree from the optometry program state that they receive average early career income of $95,369.
Ferris State University is one of the best schools in the country for getting a degree in optometry. Located in the remote town of Big Rapids, Ferris is a public university with a medium-sized student population. This university ranks 13th out of 56 colleges for overall quality in the state of Michigan.
There were about 35 optometry students who graduated with this degree at Ferris in the most recent data year. Optometry degree recipients from Ferris State University earn a boost of around $10,954 over the typical income of optometry 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 optometry school matters, so we have put together these rankings to help you make your decision. We derive our Best Overall Optometry School rankings by rolling up our degree-level rankings after weighting them by the number of degrees awarded at each school.
