2023 Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois

With all of the options students have for higher education today, it can be tough to choose which direction to take. College Factual has developed its “Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois” ranking as one item you can use to help make this decision.

Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies is the 166th most popular major in the country with 3,106 degrees awarded in 2020-2021. In 2019-2020, parks, recreation and leisure studies graduates who were awarded their degree in 2017-2019, earned an average of $31,801 and had an average of $23,333 in loans still to pay off.

Across Illinois, there were 196 parks, recreation and leisure studies graduates with average earnings and debt of $35,875 and $20,682 respectively.

This year’s “Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois” ranking looked at 4 colleges that offer degrees in a bachelor’s in parks, recreation and leisure studies. The schools that top this list are recognized because they have one of the most popular parks, recreation and leisure studies programs in the United States.

See our ranking methodology to learn more.

More Ways to Rank Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies Schools

When choosing the right school for you, it’s important to arm yourself with all the facts you can. To that end, we’ve created a number of major-specific rankings, including this “Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois” list to help you make the college decision.

In addition to our rankings, you can take two colleges and compare them based on the criteria that matters most to you in our unique tool, College Combat. If you’re torn between two schools, you can use it to help you see how they stack up against one another. Bookmark it so you can compare any new schools that might interest you.

Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois

The following schools top our list of the Best “Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois”.

Top 4 Most Popular Colleges for Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies in Illinois

1

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Champaign, Illinois

#3 overall quality in Illinois

$53,270 Average Early-Career Earnings

$19,646 Average Student Debt

Out of the 4 schools in the Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois that were part of this year’s ranking, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign landed the #1 spot on the list. Located in Champaign, Illinois, this large public school handed out 142 diplomas to qualified ’s parks and rec students in 2020-2021.

With a freshman retention rate of 94%, the school does an excellent job of retaining its undergraduate students. The school has an impressive undergrad student loan default rate. It’s only 2.3%, which is much lower than the national rate of 10.1%.

Full University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies Report

2

Southern Illinois University Carbondale
Carbondale, Illinois

$42,413 Average Early-Career Earnings

$23,104 Average Student Debt

You’ll join some of the best and brightest minds around if you attend Southern Illinois University Carbondale. The school came in at #2 for the Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois. Carbondale, Illinois is the setting for this fairly large institution of higher learning. The public school handed out ’s parks and rec degrees to 44 students in 2020-2021.

Read full report on Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies at Southern Illinois University Carbondale

3

Olivet Nazarene University
Bourbonnais, Illinois

$44,879 Average Early-Career Earnings

$26,483 Average Student Debt

You’ll be in good company if you decide to attend Olivet Nazarene University. It ranked #3 on our 2023 Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois list. Olivet Nazarene is a private not-for-profit institution located in Bourbonnais, Illinois. The school has a small population, and it awarded 6 ’s degrees in 2020-2021.

The low undergrad student loan default rate of 2.7% is a good sign that students have an easier time paying off their loans than they might at other schools. For comparison, the national default rate is 10.1%.

Full Olivet Nazarene Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies Report

4

Aurora University
Aurora, Illinois

#18 overall quality in Illinois

$47,673 Average Early-Career Earnings

$25,457 Average Student Debt

You’ll join some of the best and brightest minds around if you attend Aurora University. The school came in at #4 for the Most Well Attended Parks & Rec Major in Illinois. Aurora University is a private not-for-profit institution located in Aurora, Illinois. The school has a medium-sized population, and it awarded 4 ’s degrees in 2020-2021.

The school has an impressive undergrad student loan default rate. It’s only 4.2%, which is much lower than the national rate of 10.1%.

Read more about Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies at Aurora

• Most Popular Colleges for Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies in the Great Lakes Region
• Most Popular Colleges for Parks, Recreation & Leisure Studies

Notes and References

References

• 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 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).
• Information about the national average student loan default rate is from the U.S. Department of Education and refers to data about the 2016 borrower cohort tracking period for which the cohort default rate (CDR) was 10.1%.

Read more about our data sources and methodologies

Footnotes

• *Avg Salary and Avg 4-Year Grad Rate are for the top schools only.
• Some schools otherwise deserving of recognition may have been removed from this ranking in the event that new data identified post-publication warranted it, or at the request of the school.