If you plan on getting your master's degree in international relations & national security, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #43 in the country in terms of popularity. This means you won't have too much trouble finding schools that offer the degree.
College Factual reviewed 10 schools in the Southwest Region to determine which ones were the best for master's degree seekers in the field of international relations & national security. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 474 master's degrees in international relations & national security during the 2022-2023 academic year.
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Choosing a Great International Relations & National Security School for Your Master's Degree
Your choice of international relations & national security 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. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
Quality Overall Is Important
The overall quality of a master's degree school is important to ensure a good education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To account for this we include a school's overall Best Colleges for a Master's Degree ranking which itself looks at a host of different 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 master's degree from the school. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their master'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 international relations & national security students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - How many other international relations & national security students want to attend this school to pursue a master'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 easy is it for international relations & national security 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 international relations & national security related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for international relations & national security students working on their master's degree.
The international relations 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 International Relations & National Security Master's Degree Schools in the Southwest Region.
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It's difficult to beat Rice University if you wish to pursue a master's degree in international relations & national security. Located in the city of Houston, Rice is a private not-for-profit university with a medium-sized student population.
Those international relations & national security students who get their master's degree from Rice University make $13,806 more than the typical international relations student.
Texas A&M University - College Station is one of the best schools in the country for getting a master's degree in international relations & national security. Texas A&M College Station is a very large public university located in the city of College Station.
Soon after graduating, international relations master's recipients generally make an average of $62,266 in their early careers.
It is hard to beat The University of Texas at Austin if you want to pursue a master's degree in international relations & national security. UT Austin is a very large public university located in the city of Austin.
After graduation, international relations master's recipients generally earn about $61,625 at the beginning of their careers.
Every student pursuing a degree in a master's degree in international relations & national security needs to take a look at Arizona State University - Tempe. Located in the city of Tempe, ASU - Tempe is a public university with a very large student population.
Students who graduate with their master's from the international relations program report average early career income of $68,957.
University of Arizona is a very large public university located in the large city of Tucson.
International Relations & National Security master's degree recipients from University of Arizona earn a boost of around $7,349 above the typical earnings of international relations & national security majors.
UTEP is a very large public university located in the city of El Paso.
Master's recipients from the international relations & national security major at The University of Texas at El Paso get $11,055 above the standard college graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
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).
Your choice of international relations & national security 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. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:
