Ranked #28 in popularity, public health is one of the most sought-after bachelor's degree programs in the nation. This makes choosing the right school a hard decision.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 68 schools in the Southeast Region to determine which ones were the best for public health students pursuing a bachelor's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 4,877 bachelor's degrees in public health to qualified students.
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DEBUG: Checking offer "BA in Sociology - Community Health" with relevance 0.7
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DEBUG: Checking offer "Master of Public Health (MPH) - Global Health" with relevance 0.7
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DEBUG: Checking offer "MS in Nursing - Population Healthcare" with relevance 0.6
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DEBUG: Checking offer "BSW - Social Work (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" with relevance 0.5
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DEBUG: relevant_offers count = 9
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Choosing a Great Public Health School for Your Bachelor's Degree
Your choice of public health for getting your bachelor'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. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
Quality Overall Is Important
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.
Average Earnings
To determine the overall quality of a graduate school, one factor we look at is the average early-career salary of those receiving their bachelor's degree from the school. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their bachelor's degree is to enable themselves to find better-paying positions.
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 public health students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other public health 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 much debt public health students go into to obtain their bachelor's degree and how well they are able to pay back that debt.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized public health related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for public health students working on their bachelor's degree.
Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best Public Health Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southeast Region list, to help you choose the best school for you.
In addition to College Factual's rankings, you may want to take a look at College Combat, our unique tool that lets you pit your favorite schools head-to-head and compare how they rate on factors that most interest you.
When you have some time, check it out - you may want to bookmark the link so you don't forget it.
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DEBUG: Checking offer "Public Health (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" with relevance 1
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ADBLOCK #171
Best Schools for Bachelor’s Students to Study Public Health in the Southeast Region
Learn about the top ranked colleges and universities for public health students seeking a a bachelor's degree. Only those schools that rank in the top 20% of all the schools we analyze get awarded with a place on this list.
13 Top Southeast Region Schools for a Bachelor's in Public Health
It's hard to beat University of Florida if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in public health. Located in the medium-sized city of Gainesville, UF is a public university with a fairly large student population.
After graduation, public health bachelor's recipients typically make about $30,056 at the beginning of their careers.
University of South Carolina - Columbia is a wonderful option for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in public health. UofSC is a fairly large public university located in the city of Columbia.
Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the public health program earn about $31,756 in their early career salary.
University of Georgia is a great option for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in public health. Located in the city of Athens, UGA is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Bachelor's recipients from the public health degree program at University of Georgia get $3,577 above the typical graduate with the same degree shortly after graduation.
It is difficult to beat East Carolina University if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in public health. ECU is a fairly large public university located in the small city of Greenville.
After graduation, public health bachelor's recipients generally earn about $35,628 at the beginning of their careers.
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Additional Noteworthy Schools
These are some additional schools worth mentioning that are also great but just didn't quite make the cut to earn our top Best Public Health Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southeast Region award.
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).