Ranked #22 in popularity, fine & studio arts is one of the most sought-after bachelor's degree programs in the nation. 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 36 schools in the Southwest Region to determine which ones were the best for fine & studio arts students pursuing a bachelor's degree. Combined, these schools handed out 2,098 bachelor's degrees in fine & studio arts to qualified students.
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Choosing a Great Fine & Studio Arts School for Your Bachelor's Degree
Your choice of fine & studio arts for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. 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 much a school focuses on fine & studio arts students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - How many other fine & studio 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 fine & studio 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 fine & studio arts related body.
Our full ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for fine & studio arts students working on their bachelor's degree.
The fine arts 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 Fine & Studio Arts Bachelor's Degree Schools in the Southwest 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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Every student pursuing a degree in a bachelor's degree in fine & studio arts needs to check out The University of Texas at Austin. Located in the large city of Austin, UT Austin is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Fine & Studio Arts bachelor's degree recipients from The University of Texas at Austin receive an earnings boost of around $6,155 above the typical earnings of fine & studio arts graduates.
Arizona State University - Tempe is a good option for students pursuing a bachelor's degree in fine & studio arts. ASU - Tempe is a very large public university located in the midsize city of Tempe.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the fine arts program state that they receive average early career income of $27,762.
University of North Texas is one of the finest schools in the United States for getting a bachelor's degree in fine & studio arts. Located in the midsize city of Denton, UNT is a public university with a very large student population.
Students who graduate with their bachelor's from the fine arts program state that they receive average early career wages of $27,067.
Southern Methodist University is one of the finest schools in the country for getting a bachelor's degree in fine & studio arts. Located in the large suburb of Dallas, SMU is a private not-for-profit university with a fairly large student population.
Fine & Studio Arts bachelor's degree recipients from Southern Methodist University receive an earnings boost of about $12,221 above the average income of fine & studio arts majors.
Located in the large city of Tucson, University of Arizona is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Fine & Studio Arts bachelor's degree recipients from University of Arizona get an earnings boost of approximately $4,750 over the average earnings of fine & studio arts graduates.
Texas Tech is a fairly large public university located in the large city of Lubbock.
Fine & Studio Arts bachelor's degree recipients from Texas Tech University get an earnings boost of around $8,495 over the typical income of fine & studio arts majors.
Located in the city of San Marcos, Texas State is a public university with a fairly large student population.
Fine & Studio Arts bachelor's degree recipients from Texas State University earn a boost of around $2,512 over the average earnings of fine & studio arts graduates.
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 fine & studio arts for getting your bachelor's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. Below we explain some of the most important factors to consider before making your choice:
