2025 Best International Relations & National Security Master's Degree Schools in the Southwest Region
If you plan on getting your master's degree in
international relations & national security, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #43 in the country in terms of popularity. This means you won't have too much trouble finding schools that offer the degree.
College Factual reviewed 10 schools in the Southwest Region to determine which ones were the best for master's degree seekers in the field of international relations & national security. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 474 master's degrees in international relations & national security during the 2022-2023 academic year.
What's on this page: * Our Methodology
Choosing a Great International Relations & National Security School for Your Master's Degree
Your choice of international relations & national security for getting your master's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
Quality Overall Is Important
The overall quality of a master's degree school is important to ensure a quality education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To account for this we include a college's overall Best Colleges for a Master's Degree ranking which itself looks at a host of various factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
Average Earnings
To determine the overall quality of a graduate school, one factor we look at is the average early-career salary of those receiving their master's degree from the school. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their master's degree is to enable themselves to find better-paying positions.
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 international relations & national security students as compared to other majors.
- Major Demand - How many other international relations & national security students want to attend this school to pursue a master's degree.
- 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.
- Student Debt - How easy is it for international relations & national security to pay back their student loans after receiving their master's degree.
- Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized international relations & national security related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for international relations & national security students working on their master's degree.
One Size Does Not Fit All
The international relations school you choose to invest your time and money in matters. To help you make the decision that is right for you, we've developed a number of major-specific rankings, including this list of the Best International Relations & National Security Master's Degree Schools in the Southwest Region.
