2025 Best Public Administration Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southwest Region

a bachelor's degree in public administration is more popular than many other degrees. In fact, it ranks #103 out of 363 on popularity of all such degrees in the nation. This means you won't have too much trouble finding schools that offer the degree.

In 2025, College Factual analyzed 6 schools in order to identify the top ones for its Best Public Administration Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southwest Region ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 211 bachelor's degrees in public administration during the 2022-2023 academic year.

What's on this page: * Our Methodology

• Best Bachelor’s Degree Schools List

Choosing a Great Public Administration School for Your Bachelor's Degree

The public admin bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. 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 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 host of various 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 bachelor's degree from the school. This is because one of the main reasons people pursue their bachelor'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 much a school focuses on public administration students vs. other majors.
• Major Demand - How many other public administration 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 easy is it for public administration 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 public administration related body.

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

More Ways to Rank Public Administration Schools

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 Public Administration Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southwest Region list to help you make the college decision.

In addition to College Factual's rankings, you may want to take a look at College Combat, our unique tool that lets you pit your favorite schools head-to-head and compare how they rate on factors that most interest you. When you have some time, check it out - you may want to bookmark the link so you don't forget it.

Best Schools for Bachelor’s Students to Study Public Administration in the Southwest Region

Learn about the top ranked colleges and universities for public administration students seeking a a bachelor's degree.

Top Southwest Region Schools for a Bachelor's in Public Admin

1

University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ

32 Annual Graduates

$39,136 Median Starting Salary

University of Arizona is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in public administration. University of Arizona is a very large public university located in the large city of Tucson.

Bachelor's students who receive their degree from the public admin program make around $39,136 for their early career.

More information about a bachelor’s in public administration from University of Arizona

2

University of Phoenix - Arizona
Phoenix, AZ

56 Annual Graduates

$61,790 Median Starting Salary

Any student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in public administration needs to look into University of Phoenix - Arizona. Located in the large city of Phoenix, UOPX - Arizona is a private for-profit university with a fairly large student population.

Public Administration bachelor's degree recipients from University of Phoenix - Arizona earn a boost of about $17,369 above the average income of public administration majors.

More information about a bachelor’s in public administration from University of Phoenix - Arizona

3

University of Oklahoma Norman Campus
Norman, OK

14 Annual Graduates

It is hard to beat University of Oklahoma Norman Campus if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in public administration. University of Oklahoma is a very large public university located in the suburb of Norman.More information about a bachelor’s in public administration from University of Oklahoma Norman Campus

4

Texas State University
San Marcos, TX

30 Annual Graduates

$46,491 Median Starting Salary

Any student who is interested in a bachelor's degree in public administration needs to look into Texas State University. Texas State is a very large public university located in the small city of San Marcos.

Public Administration bachelor's degree recipients from Texas State University get an earnings boost of approximately $2,070 over the typical income of public administration graduates.

More information about a bachelor’s in public administration from Texas State University

5

The University of Texas at San Antonio
San Antonio, TX

30 Annual Graduates

$38,358 Median Starting Salary

UTSA is a fairly large public university located in the city of San Antonio.

Soon after graduation, public admin bachelor's recipients usually earn an average of $38,358 at the beginning of their careers.

More information about a bachelor’s in public administration from The University of Texas at San Antonio

6

University of Houston - Clear Lake
Houston, TX

13 Annual Graduates

Located in the midsize city of Houston, UH Clear Lake is a public university with a medium-sized student population.More information about a bachelor’s in public administration from University of Houston - Clear Lake

Best Public Administration Colleges by State

Explore the best public administration schools for a specific state in the Southwest Region .

State	Colleges	Degrees Awarded
Texas	245	115
Arizona	200	102
Oklahoma	190	23

View All Rankings >

Rankings in Majors Related to Public Admin

One of 4 majors within the Public Administration & Social Service area of study, Public Administration has other similar majors worth exploring.

Public Admin Focus Areas

Major	Annual Graduates
Public Administration	211

Majors Similar to Public Admin

Related Major	Annual Graduates
Human Services	1,215
Community Organization & Advocacy	759
Public Policy	291

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).
• Credit for the banner image above goes to The Official CTBTO Photostream. More about our data sources and methodologies.