a bachelor's degree in child development & psychology is more popular than many other degrees. In fact, it ranks #37 out of 363 on popularity of all such degrees in the nation. This means you won't have too much trouble finding schools that offer the degree.
College Factual looked at 15 colleges and universities when compiling its 2025 Best Child Development & Psychology Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region ranking. Combined, these schools handed out 3,352 bachelor's degrees in child development & psychology to qualified students.
DEBUG: Checking offer "MS in Psychology - Child & Adolescent Development Psychology" with relevance 1
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "MS in Psychology - Child & Adolescent Development Psychology" ACCEPTED (relevance 1)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Developmental Psychology (I Have a Bachelors)" with relevance 0.9
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Developmental Psychology (I Have a Bachelors)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.9)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Developmental Psychology (I Have a Masters)" with relevance 0.9
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Developmental Psychology (I Have a Masters)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.9)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Grad Cert - Child Counseling (I Have a Bachelors)" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Grad Cert - Child Counseling (I Have a Bachelors)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Psychology Bachelors Programs (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Psychology Bachelors Programs (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Psychology EdS Programs (I Have a Masters)" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Psychology EdS Programs (I Have a Masters)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Psychology Graduate Certificate Programs (I Have a Bachelors)" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Psychology Graduate Certificate Programs (I Have a Bachelors)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Psychology PhD Programs (I Have a Masters)" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Psychology PhD Programs (I Have a Masters)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Psychology PsyD Programs (I Have a Masters)" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Psychology PsyD Programs (I Have a Masters)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Science & Engineering Masters Programs (I Have a Bachelors)" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "Science & Engineering Masters Programs (I Have a Bachelors)" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "BA in Psychology" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "BA in Psychology" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "MS in Psychology" with relevance 0.8
DEBUG: ✓ Offer "MS in Psychology" ACCEPTED (relevance 0.8)
DEBUG: Checking offer "BA in Human Services - Child & Family Services" with relevance 0.7
DEBUG: ✗ Offer "BA in Human Services - Child & Family Services" REJECTED (relevance 0.7)
DEBUG: Checking offer "Child Development (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" with relevance 0.6
DEBUG: ✗ Offer "Child Development (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" REJECTED (relevance 0.6)
DEBUG: Checking offer "General Psychology (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" with relevance 0.6
DEBUG: ✗ Offer "General Psychology (I Have a HS Diploma or Associate Degree)" REJECTED (relevance 0.6)
DEBUG: Checking offer "General Psychology (I Have a Bachelors)" with relevance 0.6
DEBUG: ✗ Offer "General Psychology (I Have a Bachelors)" REJECTED (relevance 0.6)
DEBUG: Checking offer "General Psychology (I Have a Masters)" with relevance 0.6
DEBUG: ✗ Offer "General Psychology (I Have a Masters)" REJECTED (relevance 0.6)
DEBUG: relevant_offers count = 15
DEBUG: relevant_offers > 0, checking for ESYOH offers
DEBUG: ESYOH filtering - found 11 ESYOH offers with relevance >= 0.8
DEBUG: esyoh_offers count = 11
DEBUG: ESYOH offers found, rendering ESYOH widget
DEBUG: most_relevant_only = true, filtering for most relevant
DEBUG: Found 2 offers with relevance >= 1.0
Choosing a Great Child Development & Psychology School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The child 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. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
Quality Overall Is Important
The overall quality of a bachelor's degree school is important to ensure a quality education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To account for this we consider a college's overall Best Colleges 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 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
The metrics below are just some of the other metrics that we use to determine our rankings.
Major Focus - How many resources a school devotes to child development & psychology students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - The number of child development & psychology 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 much debt child development & psychology 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 child development & psychology related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for child development & psychology students working on their bachelor's degree.
More Ways to Rank Child Development & Psychology Schools
The child development school you choose to invest your time and money in matters. To help you make the decision that is right for you, we've developed a number of major-specific rankings, including this list of the Best Child Development & Psychology Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Great Lakes Region.
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.
DEBUG: Raw major_slug = "psychology//child-development-psychology"
University of Michigan - Ann Arbor is a good choice for students interested in a bachelor's degree in child development & psychology. Located in the medium-sized city of Ann Arbor, U-M is a public university with a fairly large student population.
After graduating, child development bachelor's recipients generally earn about $31,568 in their early careers.
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is a wonderful choice for students pursuing a bachelor's degree in child development & psychology. UIUC is a very large public university located in the city of Champaign.
Bachelor's graduates who receive their degree from the child development program make about $33,384 in the first couple years of working.
University of Chicago is a great decision for individuals interested in a bachelor's degree in child development & psychology. UChicago is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of Chicago.
Soon after graduation, child development bachelor's recipients typically earn around $31,986 in the first five years of their career.
Located in the suburb of Granville, Denison is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.
Child Development & Psychology bachelor's degree recipients from Denison University earn a boost of about $5,398 over the typical earnings of child development & psychology 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.
by our College Data Analytics Team
The child 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. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
