Ranked #16 in popularity, mental & social health services is one of the most sought-after master's degree programs in the nation. So, there are lots of possibilities to explore when you're trying to determine where you want to get your degree.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 9 schools in California to determine which ones were the best for mental & social health services students pursuing a master's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 1,792 master's degrees in mental & social health services to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Mental & Social Health Services School for Your Master's Degree
Your choice of mental & social health services 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
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.
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
In addition to the above, you should consider some of the following factors:
Major Focus - How many resources a school devotes to mental & social health services students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - The number of mental & social health services students who choose to seek a master's degree at the school.
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 mental & social health services 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 mental & social health services related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for mental & social health services students working on their master's degree.
More Ways to Rank Mental & Social Health Services Schools
Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best Mental & Social Health Services Master's Degree Schools in California list, to help you choose the best school for you.
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Any student who is interested in a master's degree in mental & social health services needs to check out Loma Linda University. Located in the large suburb of Loma Linda, Loma Linda University is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.
Mental & Social Health Services master's degree recipients from Loma Linda University earn a boost of around $2,738 above the average income of mental & social health services graduates.
It's hard to beat University of Southern California if you wish to pursue a master's degree in mental & social health services. USC is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of Los Angeles.
Mental & Social Health Services master's degree recipients from University of Southern California receive an earnings boost of approximately $6,044 over the typical earnings of mental & social health services graduates.
Chapman is a moderately-sized private not-for-profit university located in the midsize city of Orange.
Master's recipients from the mental & social health services program at Chapman University get $3,165 above the standard college grad in this field shortly after graduation.
Located in the midsize city of Ontario, UOPX - California is a private for-profit university with a small student population.
Those mental & social health services students who get their master's degree from University of Phoenix - California earn $2,921 more than the average mental health services graduate.
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.