Ranked #22 in popularity, music is one of the most sought-after doctor's degree programs in the nation. This makes choosing the right school a hard decision.
College Factual reviewed 4 schools in the Far Western US Region to determine which ones were the best for doctor's degree seekers in the field of music. Combined, these schools handed out 139 doctor's degrees in music to qualified students.
Earn the music business degree that fits into the business world – and partners Southern New Hampshire University with world-renowned Berklee College of Music.
Choosing a Great Music School for Your Doctor's Degree
The music doctor'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
A school that excels in educating for a particular major and degree level must be a great school overall as well. To account for this we consider a college's overall Best Colleges for a Doctor'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 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 doctor's degree from the school. After all, your doctor'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 music students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - The number of music students who choose to seek a doctor'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 music to pay back their student loans after receiving their doctor's degree.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized music related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for music students working on their doctor'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 Music Doctor's Degree Schools in the Far Western US Region list, to help you choose the best school for you.
DEBUG: Raw major_slug = "visual-and-performing-arts//music"
Earn the music business degree that fits into the business world – and partners Southern New Hampshire University with world-renowned Berklee College of Music.
University of Southern California is a good decision for individuals pursuing a doctor's degree in music. Located in the city of Los Angeles, USC is a private not-for-profit university with a very large student population.
Soon after graduating, music doctorate recipients typically make an average of $29,274 in their early careers.
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 music doctor'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:
