If you plan on getting your bachelor's degree in international relations & national security, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #58 in the country in terms of popularity. So, you have a fair amount of options to choose from when looking for a school.
In 2025, College Factual analyzed 5 schools in order to identify the top ones for its Best International Relations & National Security Bachelor's Degree Schools in Illinois ranking. Combined, these schools handed out 139 bachelor's degrees in international relations & national security to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great International Relations & National Security School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The international relations bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality international relations 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 much a school focuses on international relations & national security students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other international relations & national security 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 international relations & national security 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 international relations & national security related body.
Our complete 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 bachelor's degree.
More Ways to Rank International Relations & National Security Schools
Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best International Relations & National Security Bachelor's Degree Schools in Illinois list, to help you choose the best school for you.
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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It's difficult to beat Northwestern University if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in international relations & national security. Northwestern is a fairly large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Evanston.
Bachelor's recipients from the international relations & national security degree program at Northwestern University make $16,605 more than the standard graduate in this field shortly after graduation.
DePaul University is one of the best schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in international relations & national security. Located in the large city of Chicago, DePaul is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population.
Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the international relations program earn around $35,792 for their early career.
Wheaton College Illinois is one of the best schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in international relations & national security. Wheaton College Illinois is a small private not-for-profit college located in the suburb of Wheaton.
After graduating, international relations bachelor's recipients usually earn around $40,084 in the first five years of their career.
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).
by our College Data Analytics Team
The international relations bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality international relations program can vary widely even among the top schools. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
