2024 Best Urban Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools

When it comes to popularity, a bachelor's degree in urban studies sits in the middle of the road, ranking #163 out of 363 majors in the country. So, you may have to do some digging around to find quality schools that offer the degree program. This list can help with that.

College Factual reviewed 66 schools in the United States to determine which ones were the best for bachelor's degree seekers in the field of urban studies. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 1,051 bachelor's degrees in urban studies during the 2020-2021 academic year.

Jump to one of the following sections: * Our Methodology

• Best Bachelor’s Degree Schools List

Choosing a Great Urban Studies School for Your Bachelor's Degree

Your choice of urban studies for getting your bachelor'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. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:

Overall Quality Is a Must

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.

Average Early-Career Salaries

Average early-career salary of those graduating with their bachelor's degree is one indicator we use in our analysis to find the schools that offer the highest-quality education. After all, your bachelor's degree won't mean much if it doesn't help you find a job that will help you earn a living.

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 urban studies students as compared to other majors.
• Major Demand - How many other urban studies students want to attend this school to pursue a bachelor's degree.
• 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 easy is it for urban studies to pay back their student loans after receiving their bachelor's degree.
• Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized urban studies related body.

Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for urban studies students working on their bachelor's degree.

One Size Does Not Fit All

The urban studies 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 Urban Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools.

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 Bachelor’s Students to Study Urban Studies in the United States

Learn about the top ranked colleges and universities for urban studies students seeking a a bachelor's degree.

10 Top Schools for a Bachelor's in Urban Studies

1

University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA

32 Annual Graduates

$46,426 Median Starting Salary

University of Pennsylvania is a great choice for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in urban studies. Located in the city of Philadelphia, UPenn is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.

Urban Studies bachelor's degree recipients from University of Pennsylvania get an earnings boost of about $11,938 over the typical earnings of urban studies majors.

More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from University of Pennsylvania

2

University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA

23 Annual Graduates

University of Southern California is one of the best schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in urban studies. USC is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Los Angeles.More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from University of Southern California

3

Washington University in St Louis
Saint Louis, MO

5 Annual Graduates

It's difficult to beat Washington University in St Louis if you wish to pursue a bachelor's degree in urban studies. Located in the suburb of Saint Louis, WUSTL is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from Washington University in St Louis

4

New York University
New York, NY

33 Annual Graduates

New York University is one of the finest schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in urban studies. Located in the large city of New York, NYU is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from New York University

5

University of California - Berkeley
Berkeley, CA

35 Annual Graduates

$50,338 Median Starting Salary

$14,444 Median Student Debt

UC Berkeley is a fairly large public university located in the city of Berkeley.

Urban Studies bachelor's degree recipients from University of California - Berkeley receive an earnings boost of around $15,850 above the typical income of urban studies majors.

More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from University of California - Berkeley

6

Stanford University
Stanford, CA

12 Annual Graduates

Stanford is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the large suburb of Stanford.More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from Stanford University

7

University of California - San Diego
La Jolla, CA

38 Annual Graduates

$41,393 Median Starting Salary

$17,500 Median Student Debt

UCSD is a very large public university located in the large city of La Jolla.

Bachelor's recipients from the urban studies program at University of California - San Diego get $6,905 above the average college graduate with the same degree shortly after graduation.

More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from University of California - San Diego

8

Barnard College
New York, NY

20 Annual Graduates

$47,271 Median Starting Salary

$19,000 Median Student Debt

Located in the city of New York, Barnard is a private not-for-profit college with a small student population.

Urban Studies bachelor's degree recipients from Barnard College receive an earnings boost of around $12,783 above the average earnings of urban studies graduates.

More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from Barnard College

9

Brown University
Providence, RI

18 Annual Graduates

$23,206 Median Starting Salary

$14,000 Median Student Debt

Located in the medium-sized city of Providence, Brown is a private not-for-profit university with a large student population.

Soon after graduation, urban studies bachelor's recipients usually make around $23,206 in the first five years of their career.

More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from Brown University

10

The University of Texas at Austin
Austin, TX

29 Annual Graduates

Located in the city of Austin, UT Austin is a public university with a fairly large student population.More information about a bachelor’s in urban studies from The University of Texas at Austin

Additional Noteworthy Schools

Here are some additional great schools for Urban Studies students that almost earned our Best Urban Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools award.

Rank	College	Location
11	University of California - Irvine	Irvine, CA
12	Trinity College	Hartford, CT
13	Columbia University in the City of New York	New York, NY
14	University of Minnesota - Twin Cities	Minneapolis, MN
15	Haverford College	Haverford, PA
16	Wheaton College Illinois	Wheaton, IL

Urban Studies by Region

View the Best Urban Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools for a specific region near you.

Region
Southeast
New England
Rocky Mountains
Plains States
Middle Atlantic
Far Western US
Southwest
Other U.S. Territories
Great Lakes

View All Rankings >

Urban Studies Related Rankings by Major

Urban Studies is one of 13 different types of Social Sciences programs to choose from.

Urban Studies Concentrations

Major	Annual Graduates
Urban Studies/Affairs	1,051

Majors Similar to Urban Studies

Related Major	Annual Graduates
Political Science & Government	43,812
Economics	39,397
Sociology	29,576
International Relations & National Security	9,158
Anthropology	8,890
General Social Sciences	6,378
Geography & Cartography	4,409
Other Social Sciences	1,669
Sociology & Anthropology	541
Archeology	201

Notes and References

• 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).
• Credit for the banner image above goes to Andrew Bossi. More about our data sources and methodologies.