If you pursue a master's degree in social work, you won't be alone. The field of study is the #3 most popular program in the country. So, there are lots of possibilities to explore when you're trying to determine where you want to get your degree.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 27 schools in the Southwest Region to determine which ones were the best for social work students pursuing a master's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 3,352 master's degrees in social work to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Social Work School for Your Master's Degree
The social work master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality social work 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
The overall quality of a master's degree school is important to ensure a quality education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To account for this we consider a college's overall Best Colleges for a Master's Degree ranking which itself looks at a combination of different factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
Average Early-Career Salaries
Average early-career salary of those graduating with their master's degree is one indicator we use in our analysis to find the schools that offer the highest-quality education. After all, your master'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
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 social work students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - The number of social work students who choose to seek a master's degree at the school.
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 social work 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 social work related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for social work students working on their master's degree.
The social work 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 Social Work Master's Degree Schools in the Southwest Region.
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Any student who is interested in a master's degree in social work needs to look into The University of Texas at Austin. UT Austin is a very large public university located in the large city of Austin.
Social Work master's degree recipients from The University of Texas at Austin earn a boost of about $2,654 above the average earnings of social work graduates.
Arizona State University - Tempe is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a master's degree in social work. Located in the medium-sized city of Tempe, ASU - Tempe is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Those social work students who get their master's degree from Arizona State University - Tempe receive $3,642 more than the typical social work grad.
Any student pursuing a degree in a master's degree in social work needs to check out The University of Texas at Arlington. UT Arlington is a fairly large public university located in the large city of Arlington.
After graduation, social work master's recipients typically earn around $51,213 in their early careers.
University of Oklahoma Norman Campus is one of the finest schools in the country for getting a master's degree in social work. University of Oklahoma is a very large public university located in the suburb of Norman.
Master's recipients from the social work major at University of Oklahoma Norman Campus make $2,246 above the standard graduate with the same degree when they enter the workforce.
ASU - Skysong is a very large public university located in the midsize city of Scottsdale.
Social Work master's degree recipients from Arizona State University - Skysong earn a boost of about $3,642 over the typical income of social work graduates.
Texas State is a fairly large public university located in the city of San Marcos.
Social Work master's degree recipients from Texas State University earn a boost of approximately $4,324 over the typical earnings of social work majors.
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 work master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality social work program can vary widely even among the top schools. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
