If you plan on getting your bachelor's degree in drama & theater arts, you won't be alone since the degree program is ranked #38 in the country in terms of popularity. As a result, there are many college that offer the degree, making your choice of school a hard one.
For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 5 schools in Washington to determine which ones were the best for drama & theater arts students pursuing a bachelor's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 170 bachelor's degrees in drama & theater arts to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Drama & Theater Arts School for Your Bachelor's Degree
Your choice of drama & theater arts for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. Important measures of a quality theater 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 much a school focuses on drama & theater arts students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other drama & theater arts 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 drama & theater arts 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 drama & theater arts related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for drama & theater arts 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 Drama & Theater Arts Bachelor's Degree Schools in Washington 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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University of Washington - Seattle Campus is one of the finest schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in drama & theater arts. Located in the city of Seattle, UW Seattle is a public university with a very large student population.
Soon after graduating, theater bachelor's recipients generally make around $22,778 at the beginning of their careers.
It's hard to beat Western Washington University if you wish to pursue a bachelor's degree in drama & theater arts. WWU is a fairly large public university located in the small city of Bellingham.
Drama & Theater Arts bachelor's degree recipients from Western Washington University get an earnings boost of around $2,122 over the typical income of drama & theater arts majors.
It is difficult to beat Central Washington University if you want to pursue a bachelor's degree in drama & theater arts. Located in the distant town of Ellensburg, CWU is a public university with a medium-sized student population.
Drama & Theater Arts bachelor's degree recipients from Central Washington University earn a boost of around $2,538 above the typical earnings of drama & theater arts graduates.
Cornish College of the Arts is a wonderful decision for students pursuing a bachelor's degree in drama & theater arts. Cornish College of the Arts is a fairly small private not-for-profit college located in the large city of Seattle.
After graduating, theater bachelor's recipients generally earn around $19,045 in their early careers.
Located in the large suburb of Tacoma, PLU is a private not-for-profit university with a small student population.
Drama & Theater Arts bachelor's degree recipients from Pacific Lutheran University earn a boost of around $3,618 over the average earnings of drama & theater arts 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).