Ranked #12 in popularity, political science & government is one of the most sought-after bachelor's degree programs in the nation. This means there are lots of options to choose from when you decide to get your degree.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 22 schools in Illinois to determine which ones were the best for political science & government students pursuing a bachelor's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 1,291 bachelor's degrees in political science & government to qualified students.
Gain a solid understanding of American political history, the current political landscape, and the major political parties with this online bachelor's from Southern New Hampshire University.
Choosing a Great Political Science & Government School for Your Bachelor's Degree
Your choice of political science & government for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. Important measures of a quality political science program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
A Great Overall School
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.
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
In addition to the above, you should consider some of the following factors:
Major Focus - How many resources a school devotes to political science & government students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - How many other political science & government 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 much debt political science & government 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 political science & government related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for political science & government students working on their bachelor's degree.
Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best Political Science & Government Bachelor's Degree Schools in Illinois list, to help you choose the best school for you.
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.
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Gain a solid understanding of American political history, the current political landscape, and the major political parties with this online bachelor's from Southern New Hampshire University.
Any student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in political science & government has to look into University of Chicago. Located in the city of Chicago, UChicago is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Political Science & Government bachelor's degree recipients from University of Chicago receive an earnings boost of about $20,404 over the average earnings of political science & government majors.
Northwestern University is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in political science & government. Northwestern is a very large private not-for-profit university located in the city of Evanston.
Political Science & Government bachelor's degree recipients from Northwestern University get an earnings boost of around $19,119 above the average income of political science & government graduates.
Any student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in political science & government needs to look into University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Located in the city of Champaign, UIUC is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the political science program earn about $35,172 in their early career salary.
Loyola University Chicago is one of the best schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in political science & government. Located in the city of Chicago, Loyola Chicago is a private not-for-profit university with a large student population.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the political science program report average early career wages of $37,007.
Wheaton College Illinois is a small private not-for-profit college located in the large suburb of Wheaton.
Those political science & government students who get their bachelor's degree from Wheaton College Illinois receive $9,451 more than the standard political science graduate.
UIC is a very large public university located in the large city of Chicago.
Bachelor's recipients from the political science & government major at University of Illinois at Chicago earn $2,745 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 political science & government for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. Important measures of a quality political science program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
