Mechanical Engineering is of the hottest master's degree programs in the United States, coming in as the #29 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 reviewed 17 schools in California to determine which ones were the best for master's degree seekers in the field of mechanical engineering. Combined, these schools handed out 1,131 master's degrees in mechanical engineering to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Mechanical Engineering School for Your Master's Degree
Your choice of mechanical engineering for getting your master'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
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 take this into account we consider a college's overall Best Colleges for a Master's Degree ranking which itself looks at a combination of various 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 mechanical engineering students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - The number of mechanical engineering students who choose to seek a master's degree at the school.
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 mechanical engineering 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 mechanical engineering related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for mechanical engineering 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 Mechanical Engineering Master's Degree Schools in California list to help you make the college decision.
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It is hard to beat Stanford University if you wish to pursue a master's degree in mechanical engineering. Located in the suburb of Stanford, Stanford is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Mechanical Engineering master's degree recipients from Stanford University receive an earnings boost of approximately $19,108 over the average income of mechanical engineering graduates.
University of Southern California is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a master's degree in mechanical engineering. Located in the large city of Los Angeles, USC is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population.
Mechanical Engineering master's degree recipients from University of Southern California receive an earnings boost of approximately $4,435 above the typical earnings of mechanical engineering majors.
University of California - Los Angeles is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a master's degree in mechanical engineering. UCLA is a fairly large public university located in the large city of Los Angeles.
Master's recipients from the mechanical engineering major at University of California - Los Angeles get $6,592 above the typical college grad with the same degree shortly after graduation.
SCU is a medium-sized private not-for-profit university located in the medium-sized city of Santa Clara.
Mechanical Engineering master's degree recipients from Santa Clara University get an earnings boost of around $21,758 over the typical earnings of mechanical engineering graduates.
Located in the large city of La Jolla, UCSD is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Mechanical Engineering master's degree recipients from University of California - San Diego get an earnings boost of around $10,696 over the typical earnings of mechanical engineering graduates.
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).
Your choice of mechanical engineering for getting your master'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:
