2025 Best Criminology Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southeast Region

If you plan on getting your bachelor's degree in criminology, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #53 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.

For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 27 schools in the Southeast Region to determine which ones were the best for criminology students pursuing a bachelor's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 2,512 bachelor's degrees in criminology to qualified students.

What's on this page: * Our Methodology

• Best Bachelor’s Degree Schools List

Choosing a Great Criminology School for Your Bachelor's Degree

Your choice of criminology 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. 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 quality education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To take this into account we consider a school's overall Best Colleges ranking which itself looks at a collection 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 many resources a school devotes to criminology students as compared to other majors.
• Major Demand - How many other criminology students want to attend this school to pursue a bachelor's degree.
• 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 criminology 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 criminology related body.

Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for criminology students working on their bachelor's degree.

One Size Does Not Fit All

When choosing the right school for you, it's important to arm yourself with all the facts you can. To that end, we've created a number of major-specific rankings, including this Best Criminology Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southeast Region list to help you make the college 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.

Best Schools for Bachelor’s Students to Study Criminology in the Southeast Region

The following list ranks the best colleges and universities for pursuing a bachelor's degree in criminology.

10 Top Southeast Region Schools for a Bachelor's in Criminology

1

University of Florida
Gainesville, FL

209 Annual Graduates

$35,096 Median Starting Salary

$22,816 Median Student Debt

Any student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in criminology has to look into University of Florida. UF is a fairly large public university located in the medium-sized city of Gainesville.

Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the criminology program make around $35,096 for their early career.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from University of Florida

2

University of South Florida - Main Campus
Tampa, FL

387 Annual Graduates

$37,108 Median Starting Salary

$28,573 Median Student Debt

University of South Florida - Main Campus is one of the best schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in criminology. Located in the city of Tampa, USF Tampa is a public university with a very large student population.

Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the criminology program state that they receive average early career income of $37,108.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from University of South Florida - Main Campus

3

The University of Alabama
Tuscaloosa, AL

253 Annual Graduates

It's difficult to beat The University of Alabama if you wish to pursue a bachelor's degree in criminology. Located in the midsize city of Tuscaloosa, UA is a public university with a fairly large student population.More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from The University of Alabama

4

Old Dominion University
Norfolk, VA

192 Annual Graduates

$37,255 Median Starting Salary

$19,666 Median Student Debt

It's hard to beat Old Dominion University if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in criminology. Old Dominion is a fairly large public university located in the midsize city of Norfolk.

Bachelor's recipients from the criminology program at Old Dominion University make $2,009 more than the average graduate with the same degree shortly after graduation.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from Old Dominion University

5

University of Miami
Coral Gables, FL

41 Annual Graduates

$29,670 Median Starting Salary

Located in the suburb of Coral Gables, U Miami is a private not-for-profit university with a large student population.

Soon after graduation, criminology bachelor's recipients typically earn around $29,670 in the first five years of their career.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from University of Miami

6

Clemson University
Clemson, SC

97 Annual Graduates

$38,057 Median Starting Salary

Located in the midsize suburb of Clemson, Clemson is a public university with a very large student population.

Those criminology students who get their bachelor's degree from Clemson University receive $2,811 more than the typical criminology grad.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from Clemson University

7

The University of Tampa
Tampa, FL

136 Annual Graduates

$34,137 Median Starting Salary

$54,487 Median Student Debt

Located in the large city of Tampa, UT is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.

Bachelor's graduates who receive their degree from the criminology program earn about $34,137 in the first couple years of working.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from The University of Tampa

8

University of North Carolina at Wilmington
Wilmington, NC

122 Annual Graduates

$34,443 Median Starting Salary

$21,903 Median Student Debt

UNCW is a fairly large public university located in the medium-sized city of Wilmington.

Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the criminology program state that they receive average early career earnings of $34,443.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from University of North Carolina at Wilmington

9

Georgia Southern University
Statesboro, GA

155 Annual Graduates

$35,588 Median Starting Salary

$17,894 Median Student Debt

GaSou is a fairly large public university located in the town of Statesboro.

Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the criminology program earn about $35,588 in their early career salary.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from Georgia Southern University

10

North Carolina State University
Raleigh, NC

67 Annual Graduates

$35,076 Median Starting Salary

Located in the large city of Raleigh, NC State is a public university with a very large student population.

Soon after graduating, criminology bachelor's recipients typically earn an average of $35,076 in their early careers.

More information about a bachelor’s in criminology from North Carolina State University

Best Criminology Colleges by State

Explore the best criminology colleges for a specific state in the Southeast Region .

State	Colleges	Degrees Awarded
Florida	225	870
Georgia	224	299
Tennessee	220	13
North Carolina	213	208
Virginia	213	300
South Carolina	195	117
Kentucky	187	74
Alabama	184	262
Louisiana	171	36
Mississippi	169	70
Arkansas	167	109
West Virginia	147	148

View All Rankings >

Criminology Related Rankings by Major

Criminology is one of 0 different types of <nil> programs to choose from.

Criminology Concentrations

Major	Annual Graduates
Criminology	2,512

Notes and References

• 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). More about our data sources and methodologies.