If you pursue a master's degree in curriculum & instruction, you won't be alone. The field of study is the #13 most popular program 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 8 schools in Tennessee to determine which ones were the best for curriculum & instruction students pursuing a master's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 599 master's degrees in curriculum & instruction to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Curriculum & Instruction School for Your Master's Degree
The curriculum master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality curriculum 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 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.
Early-Career Earnings
One measure we use to determine the quality of a school is to look at the average salary of master's graduates during the early years of their career. That is, everyone wants their master'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 curriculum & instruction students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - How many other curriculum & instruction students want to attend this school to pursue a master'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 curriculum & instruction 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 curriculum & instruction related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for curriculum & instruction 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 Curriculum & Instruction Master's Degree Schools in Tennessee list to help you make the college decision.
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It's hard to beat Lipscomb University if you wish to pursue a master's degree in curriculum & instruction. Located in the city of Nashville, Lipscomb is a private not-for-profit university with a medium-sized student population.
Students who graduate with their master's from the curriculum program state that they receive average early career wages of $51,922.
Any student pursuing a degree in a master's degree in curriculum & instruction has to look into Tennessee Technological University. Located in the remote town of Cookeville, Tennessee Tech University is a public university with a large student population.
Master's students who receive their degree from the curriculum program make around $47,918 for their early career.
Middle Tennessee State University is one of the best schools in the country for getting a master's degree in curriculum & instruction. Middle Tennessee State University is a fairly large public university located in the medium-sized city of Murfreesboro.
Master's graduates who receive their degree from the curriculum program make an average of $52,200 for their early career.
Any student who is interested in a master's degree in curriculum & instruction needs to look into University of Memphis. UofM is a very large public university located in the large city of Memphis.
Students who graduate with their master's from the curriculum program state that they receive average early career income of $49,673.
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).
The curriculum master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality curriculum program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
