When it comes to popularity, a bachelor's degree in pastoral counseling & specialized ministries sits in the middle of the road, ranking #161 out of 363 majors in the country. So, you may have to do some digging around to find quality schools that offer the degree program. This list can help with that.
In 2025, College Factual analyzed 3 schools in order to identify the top ones for its Best Pastoral Counseling & Specialized Ministries Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southeast Region ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 308 bachelor's degrees in pastoral counseling & specialized ministries during the 2022-2023 academic year.
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Choosing a Great Pastoral Counseling & Specialized Ministries School for Your Bachelor's Degree
The pastoral counseling bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality pastoral counseling 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 many resources a school devotes to pastoral counseling & specialized ministries students as compared to other majors.
Major Demand - The number of pastoral counseling & specialized ministries students who choose to seek a bachelor's degree at the school.
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 pastoral counseling & specialized ministries 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 pastoral counseling & specialized ministries related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best colleges for pastoral counseling & specialized ministries students working on their bachelor's degree.
The pastoral counseling 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 Pastoral Counseling & Specialized Ministries Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southeast Region.
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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Lee University is a great choice for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in pastoral counseling & specialized ministries. Located in the city of Cleveland, Lee University is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.
Pastoral Counseling & Specialized Ministries bachelor's degree recipients from Lee University earn a boost of approximately $2,918 above the typical income of pastoral counseling & specialized ministries graduates.
Any student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in pastoral counseling & specialized ministries needs to look into Liberty University. Located in the city of Lynchburg, Liberty University is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the pastoral counseling program state that they receive average early career earnings of $34,083.
Regent University is a wonderful decision for individuals pursuing a bachelor's degree in pastoral counseling & specialized ministries. Regent is a large private not-for-profit university located in the large city of Virginia Beach.
After graduating, pastoral counseling bachelor's recipients typically make about $33,407 in their early careers.
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Pastoral Counseling & Specialized Ministries Related Rankings by Major
One of 7 majors within the Theology & Religious Vocations area of study, Pastoral Counseling & Specialized Ministries has other similar majors worth exploring.
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.
The pastoral counseling bachelor's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality pastoral counseling program can vary widely even among the top schools. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
