Special Education is of the hottest master's degree programs in the United States, coming in as the #8 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 15 colleges and universities when compiling its 2025 Best Special Education Master's Degree Schools in Pennsylvania ranking. Combined, these schools handed out 884 master's degrees in special education to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Special Education School for Your Master's Degree
The special ed master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality special ed program can vary widely even among the top schools. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
Overall Quality Is a Must
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 combination of different factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
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
The metrics below are just some of the other metrics that we use to determine our rankings.
Major Focus - How much a school focuses on special education students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other special education 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 special education 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 special education related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for special education students working on their master's degree.
Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we've developed the Best Special Education Master's Degree Schools in Pennsylvania ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.
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Saint Joseph's University is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a master's degree in special education. Located in the large city of Philadelphia, St. Joe's is a private not-for-profit university with a medium-sized student population.
Students who graduate with their master's from the special ed program state that they receive average early career income of $56,588.
Every student pursuing a degree in a master's degree in special education needs to take a look at Temple University. Temple is a fairly large public university located in the city of Philadelphia.
Master's graduates who receive their degree from the special ed program make an average of $57,286 in their early career salary.
Any student who is interested in a master's degree in special education has to take a look at University of Scranton. Located in the small city of Scranton, University of Scranton is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.More information about a master’s in special education from University of Scranton
Located in the large city of Philadelphia, Holy Family is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.
Special Education master's degree recipients from Holy Family University receive an earnings boost of around $9,079 above the average income of special education graduates.
Located in the suburb of Radnor, Cabrini University is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.
Master's recipients from the special education major at Cabrini University earn $5,020 more than the standard college graduate in this field when they enter the workforce.
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 special ed master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality special ed program can vary widely even among the top schools. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
