If you plan on getting your associate degree in computer programming, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #38 in the country in terms of popularity. This means you won't have too much trouble finding schools that offer the degree.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 2 schools in Pennsylvania to determine which ones were the best for computer programming students pursuing a associate degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 83 associate degrees in computer programming during the 2022-2023 academic year.
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Average Earnings
One measure we use to determine the quality of a school is to look at the average salary of associate graduates during the early years of their career. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their associate degree is to enable themselves to find better-paying positions.
Other Factors We Consider
In addition to the above, you should consider some of the following factors:
Major Focus - How much a school focuses on computer programming students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other computer programming students want to attend this school to pursue a associate 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 much debt computer programming students go into to obtain their associate 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 computer programming related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for computer programming students working on their associate degree.
The programming 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 Computer Programming Associate Degree Schools in Pennsylvania.
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It is difficult to beat Community College of Allegheny County if you wish to pursue an associate degree in computer programming. CCAC is a large public college located in the large city of Pittsburgh.
Associate recipients from the computer programming major at Community College of Allegheny County get $4,406 above the standard college graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
Pittsburgh Technical College is one of the best schools in the country for getting an associate degree in computer programming. Located in the large suburb of Oakdale, Pittsburgh Technical College is a private not-for-profit college with a fairly small student population.
Students who graduate with their associate from the programming program report average early career wages of $33,829.
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).
