Ocean Engineeringbachelor's programs are on the lower end of the spectrum in terms of popularity. In fact, the major degree program ranks #267 out of the 363 majors we look at each year. This may make is a little harder to find a school that is a good fit for you.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 4 schools in the United States to determine which ones were the best for ocean engineering students pursuing a bachelor's degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 165 bachelor's degrees in ocean engineering during the <nil> academic year.
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Choosing a Great Ocean Engineering School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The oe bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality oe 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 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 bachelor's graduates during the early years of their career. That is, everyone wants their bachelor'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 much a school focuses on ocean engineering students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other ocean engineering students want to attend this school to pursue a bachelor'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 ocean engineering to pay back their student loans after receiving their bachelor's degree.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized ocean engineering related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for ocean engineering students working on their bachelor's degree.
Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we've developed the Best Ocean Engineering Bachelor's Degree Schools ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.
In addition to our rankings, you can take two colleges and compare them based on the criteria that matters most to you in our unique tool, College Combat.
Test it out when you get a chance! You may also want to bookmark the link and share it with others who are trying to make the college decision.
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Texas A&M University - College Station is one of the finest schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in ocean engineering. Located in the midsize city of College Station, Texas A&M College Station is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Ocean Engineering bachelor's degree recipients from Texas A&M University - College Station receive an earnings boost of approximately $2,002 over the typical earnings of ocean engineering majors.
It's hard to beat University of Rhode Island if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in ocean engineering. Located in the large suburb of Kingston, URI is a public university with a large student population.
Soon after graduating, oe bachelor's recipients generally earn an average of $70,939 at the beginning of their careers.
Florida Atlantic University is a great decision for students pursuing a bachelor's degree in ocean engineering. FAU is a very large public university located in the small city of Boca Raton.
Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the oe program earn around $67,941 in the first couple years of working.
Florida Institute of Technology is one of the finest schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in ocean engineering. Florida Tech is a moderately-sized private not-for-profit school located in the city of Melbourne.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the oe program state that they receive average early career earnings of $68,475.
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 oe bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality oe program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
