a bachelor's degree in general social sciences is more popular than many other degrees. In fact, it ranks #67 out of 363 on popularity of all such degrees in the nation. So, you have a fair amount of options to choose from when looking for a school.
College Factual looked at 12 colleges and universities when compiling its 2025 Best General Social Sciences Bachelor's Degree Schools in California ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 525 bachelor's degrees in general social sciences during the 2022-2023 academic year.
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Choosing a Great General Social Sciences School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The social sciences bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality social sciences program can vary widely even among the top schools. 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 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 bachelor's degree is one indicator we use in our analysis to find the schools that offer the highest-quality education. After all, your bachelor'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 general social sciences students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - How many other general social sciences 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 easy is it for general social sciences 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 general social sciences related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for general social sciences students working on their bachelor's degree.
The social sciences 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 General Social Sciences Bachelor's Degree Schools in California.
To further help you make the college decision, we've developed a unique tool called College Combat that allows you to compare schools based on the factors that matter the most to you.
Go ahead and give it a try, or bookmark the link so you can check it out later.
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University of Southern California is a good choice for students pursuing a bachelor's degree in general social sciences. USC is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Los Angeles.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the social sciences program report average early career income of $33,789.
Any student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in general social sciences has to check out University of California - Irvine. UC Irvine is a very large public university located in the large city of Irvine.
After graduation, social sciences bachelor's recipients usually make around $34,871 in their early careers.
California State University - Chico is a wonderful decision for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in general social sciences. Located in the city of Chico, Chico State is a public university with a large student population.
Bachelor's recipients from the general social sciences major at California State University - Chico make $3,271 more than the standard graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
Located in the large city of Sacramento, Sac State is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Bachelor's recipients from the general social sciences program at California State University - Sacramento earn $5,950 above the average college graduate with the same degree when they enter the workforce.
Located in the small suburb of Turlock, Stan State is a public university with a medium-sized student population.
General Social Sciences bachelor's degree recipients from California State University - Stanislaus earn a boost of around $6,038 over the average income of general social sciences 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.
Some other college data, including much of the graduate earnings data, comes from the U.S. Department of Education’s (College Scorecard).
The social sciences bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality social sciences program can vary widely even among the top schools. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
