If you plan on getting your bachelor's degree in human development & family studies, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #39 in the country in terms of popularity. As a result, there are many college that offer the degree, making your choice of school a hard one.
In 2025, College Factual analyzed 7 schools in order to identify the top ones for its Best Human Development & Family Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Rocky Mountains Region ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 1,274 bachelor's degrees in human development & family studies during the 2022-2023 academic year.
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Choosing a Great Human Development & Family Studies School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The human development bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
A Great Overall School
The overall quality of a bachelor's degree school is important to ensure a good education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To account for this we include a college's overall Best Colleges 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.
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
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 human development & family studies students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - The number of human development & family studies students who choose to seek a bachelor'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 human development & family studies 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 human development & family studies related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for human development & family studies students working on their bachelor's degree.
More Ways to Rank Human Development & Family Studies Schools
Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best Human Development & Family Studies Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Rocky Mountains Region list, to help you choose the best school for you.
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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It is hard to beat Brigham Young University - Provo if you wish to pursue a bachelor's degree in human development & family studies. Located in the city of Provo, BYU is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
After graduating, human development bachelor's recipients typically make around $25,342 in the first five years of their career.
Any student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in human development & family studies needs to take a look at Utah State University. USU is a very large public university located in the city of Logan.
Soon after graduation, human development bachelor's recipients generally make around $26,561 in the first five years of their career.
It's hard to beat University of Idaho if you wish to pursue a bachelor's degree in human development & family studies. Located in the town of Moscow, U of I is a public university with a large student population.
Human Development & Family Studies bachelor's degree recipients from University of Idaho receive an earnings boost of about $4,161 over the average income of human development & family studies majors.
Every student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in human development & family studies has to take a look at University of Colorado Denver/Anschutz Medical Campus. CU Anschutz is a fairly large public university located in the city of Denver.
Bachelor's recipients from the human development & family studies program at University of Colorado Denver/Anschutz Medical Campus get $5,055 above the standard college graduate with the same degree when they enter the workforce.
Located in the city of Ogden, WSU is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Human Development & Family Studies bachelor's degree recipients from Weber State University get an earnings boost of approximately $5,682 over the typical income of human development & family studies graduates.
Human Development & Family Studies Related Rankings by Major
One of 8 majors within the Family, Consumer & Human Sciences area of study, Human Development & Family Studies has other similar majors worth exploring.
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).