Accounting is of the hottest master's degree programs in the United States, coming in as the #10 most popular major in the country. So, there are lots of possibilities to explore when you're trying to determine where you want to get your degree.
College Factual looked at 45 colleges and universities when compiling its 2025 Best Accounting Master's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 1,646 master's degrees in accounting during the 2022-2023 academic year.
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Choosing a Great Accounting School for Your Master's Degree
The accounting master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. 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 for a Master's Degree 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 master's degree is one indicator we use in our analysis to find the schools that offer the highest-quality education. After all, your master'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 accounting students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - The number of accounting students who choose to seek a master'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 accounting students go into to obtain their master'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 accounting related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for accounting students working on their master'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 Accounting Master's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region list to help you make the college decision.
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Every student who is interested in a master's degree in accounting needs to take a look at University of Notre Dame. Located in the large suburb of Notre Dame, Notre Dame is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.More information about a master’s in accounting from University of Notre Dame
Every student who is interested in a master's degree in accounting needs to take a look at University of Wisconsin - Madison. Located in the large city of Madison, UW - Madison is a public university with a very large student population.
Accounting master's degree recipients from University of Wisconsin - Madison receive an earnings boost of approximately $2,869 over the typical earnings of accounting graduates.
DePaul University is a good choice for students pursuing a master's degree in accounting. Located in the city of Chicago, DePaul is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Accounting master's degree recipients from DePaul University get an earnings boost of about $6,098 over the average income of accounting graduates.
Indiana University - Bloomington is a good option for individuals pursuing a master's degree in accounting. IU Bloomington is a very large public university located in the city of Bloomington.
Those accounting students who get their master's degree from Indiana University - Bloomington earn $9,507 more than the standard accounting grad.
Miami University - Oxford is a large public university located in the fringe town of Oxford.
Accounting master's degree recipients from Miami University - Oxford get an earnings boost of around $2,122 above the average income of accounting graduates.
Located in the city of Chicago, Loyola Chicago is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Master's recipients from the accounting major at Loyola University Chicago earn $6,434 more than the average college graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
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Additional Noteworthy Schools
These are some additional schools worth mentioning that are also great but just didn't quite make the cut to earn our top Best Accounting Master's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region award.
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).