Criminal Justice & Corrections is of the hottest bachelor's degree programs in the United States, coming in as the #7 most popular major in the country. This means there are lots of options to choose from when you decide to get your degree.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 4 schools in District of Columbia to determine which ones were the best for criminal justice & corrections students pursuing a bachelor's degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 318 bachelor's degrees in criminal justice & corrections during the 2022-2023 academic year.
Choosing a Great Criminal Justice & Corrections School for Your Bachelor's Degree
Your choice of criminal justice & corrections for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. Important measures of a quality criminal justice program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
A Great Overall School
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.
Early-Career Earnings
One measure we use to determine the quality of a school is to look at the average salary of bachelor's graduates during the early years of their career. That is, everyone wants their bachelor's degree to be worth something, and salaries are one measure of determining that.
Other Factors We Consider
In addition to the above, you should consider some of the following factors:
Major Focus - How many resources a school devotes to criminal justice & corrections students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - The number of criminal justice & corrections 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 much debt criminal justice & corrections students go into to obtain their bachelor's degree and how well they are able to pay back that debt.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized criminal justice & corrections related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for criminal justice & corrections students working on their bachelor's degree.
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 Best Criminal Justice & Corrections Bachelor's Degree Schools in District of Columbia 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.
Test it out when you get a chance! You may also want to bookmark the link and share it with others who are trying to make the college decision.
Best Schools for Bachelor’s Students to Study Criminal Justice & Corrections in District of Columbia
Explore the top ranked colleges and universities for criminal justice & corrections students seeking a a bachelor's degree.
Top District of Columbia Schools for a Bachelor's in Criminal Justice
George Washington University is a great option for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in criminal justice & corrections. GWU is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Washington.
Criminal Justice & Corrections bachelor's degree recipients from George Washington University earn a boost of about $9,523 above the average earnings of criminal justice & corrections majors.
American University is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in criminal justice & corrections. The American University is a large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Washington.
Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the criminal justice program earn about $37,147 in their early career salary.
It is difficult to beat Howard University if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in criminal justice & corrections. Located in the city of Washington, Howard is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the criminal justice program earn about $27,801 in their early career salary.
Trinity Washington University is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in criminal justice & corrections. Located in the city of Washington, Trinity College is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.
Criminal Justice & Corrections bachelor's degree recipients from Trinity Washington University earn a boost of approximately $5,652 over the average earnings of criminal justice & corrections graduates.
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.
Your choice of criminal justice & corrections for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. Important measures of a quality criminal justice program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
