2025 Best Culinary Arts/Chef Training Schools in Illinois
3Colleges in Illinois
408Culinary Arts/Chef Training Degrees Awarded
Culinary Arts/Chef Training is above average in terms of popularity with it being the #168 most popular degree program in the country. So, you have a fair amount of options to choose from when looking for a school.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 3 schools in Illinois to determine which ones were the best for culinary arts/chef training students pursuing a degree. Combined, these schools handed out 408 degrees in culinary arts/chef training to qualified students.
Choosing a Great Culinary Arts/Chef Training School
Your choice of culinary arts/chef training school matters, so we have put together these rankings to help you make your decision. We derive our Best Overall Culinary Arts/Chef Training 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.
Pick Your Culinary Arts/Chef Training Degree Level
Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we've developed the Best Culinary Arts/Chef Training Schools in Illinois ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.
More interested in schools in a specific area of the country? Filter this list by region or state.
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 Culinary Arts/Chef Training in Illinois
The schools below may not offer all types of culinary arts/chef training degrees so you may want to filter by degree level first. However, they are great for the degree levels they do offer.
Top Illinois Schools in Culinary Arts/Chef Training
It's difficult to beat National Louis University if you wish to pursue a degree in culinary arts/chef training. Located in the city of Chicago, NLU is a private not-for-profit university with a medium-sized student population. A Best Colleges rank of #385 out of 2,152 schools nationwide means NLU is a great university overall.
There were approximately 71 culinary arts/chef training students who graduated with this degree at NLU in the most recent year we have data available.
Joliet Junior College is a great decision for students pursuing a degree in culinary arts/chef training. Joliet Junior College is a moderately-sized public college located in the suburb of Joliet. This college ranks 55th out of 85 schools for overall quality in the state of Illinois.
There were roughly 39 culinary arts/chef training students who graduated with this degree at Joliet Junior College in the most recent year we have data available.
City Colleges of Chicago - Kennedy-King College is one of the best schools in the country for getting a degree in culinary arts/chef training. Located in the city of Chicago, Kennedy-King College is a public college with a small student population. This college ranks 82nd out of 85 schools for overall quality in the state of Illinois.
There were about 59 culinary arts/chef training students who graduated with this degree at Kennedy-King College in the most recent data year.
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 culinary arts/chef training school matters, so we have put together these rankings to help you make your decision. We derive our Best Overall Culinary Arts/Chef Training School rankings by rolling up our degree-level rankings after weighting them by the number of degrees awarded at each school.
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