Best Community Colleges in Arkansas 2024

Badge for BEST IN ARKANSAS COMMUNITY COLLEGES

Published: Mar 8, 2021
Updated: Oct 16, 2023

The best community colleges provide an effective springboard into higher education, offering students high-quality two-year degree programs in a wide range of disciplines. The top-rated community colleges in Arkansas offer a broad selection of associate’s degrees, affordable tuition rates, and strong partnerships with public four-year schools so that students can easily transfer their credits into accredited bachelor’s degree programs.

10 Best Community Colleges in Arkansas

Northwest Arkansas Community College
University of Arkansas Community College at Batesville
North Arkansas College
University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton
Cossatot Community College
Arkansas State University-Newport
National Park College
Arkansas State University-Beebe
Southeast Arkansas College
Arkansas State University Mid-South

University of Arkansas Community College at Batesville
Northwest Arkansas Community College
University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton
North Arkansas College
Southern Arkansas University Tech
Arkansas State University Mid-South
Southeast Arkansas College
Cossatot Community College
Arkansas State University-Beebe
Black River Technical College

University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton 100%

University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton 20 to 1
Cossatot Community College 17 to 1
Arkansas Northeastern College 17 to 1
Black River Technical College 16 to 1
University of Arkansas Rich Mountain 16 to 1
Arkansas State University-Beebe 15 to 1
University of Arkansas – Pulaski Technical College 15 to 1
National Park College 14 to 1
Arkansas State University–Mountain Home 14 to 1
Northwest Arkansas Community College 13 to 1

Southern Arkansas University Tech $4,519
University of Arkansas – Pulaski Technical College $4,140
Northwest Arkansas Community College $3,480
National Park College $3,300
Southeast Arkansas College $3,000
East Arkansas Community College $2,940
Arkansas State University Mid-South $2,832
Ozarka College $2,790
Cossatot Community College $2,700
North Arkansas College $2,664

University of Arkansas Hope-Texarkana
University of Arkansas Rich Mountain
Arkansas State University–Mountain Home
Arkansas State University Three Rivers
East Arkansas Community College
Arkansas Northeastern College
University of Arkansas – Pulaski Technical College
Phillips Community College of the University of Arkansas
South Arkansas Community College
Ozarka College

University of Arkansas Hope-Texarkana
University of Arkansas Rich Mountain
Arkansas State University–Mountain Home
University of Arkansas – Pulaski Technical College
Arkansas Northeastern College
East Arkansas Community College
Ozarka College
National Park College
South Arkansas Community College
Arkansas State University Three Rivers

University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton 100%

Southeast Arkansas College 9 to 1
Phillips Community College of the University of Arkansas 10 to 1
Arkansas State University-Newport 11 to 1
Arkansas State University Mid-South 11 to 1
Southern Arkansas University Tech 11 to 1
East Arkansas Community College 11 to 1
North Arkansas College 12 to 1
Arkansas State University Three Rivers 12 to 1
University of Arkansas Hope-Texarkana 12 to 1
Northwest Arkansas Community College 13 to 1

University of Arkansas Community College at Batesville $2,256
South Arkansas Community College $2,328
Arkansas Northeastern College $2,352
University of Arkansas Rich Mountain $2,376
Arkansas State University-Newport $2,400
Black River Technical College $2,448
Arkansas State University–Mountain Home $2,472
Arkansas State University Three Rivers $2,496
Arkansas State University-Beebe $2,544
University of Arkansas Hope-Texarkana $2,550

Colleges and Universities in Arkansas

Colleges and universities in Arkansas are uniquely affordable, with just under half providing tuition rates of $9,000 or less. We’ve also found 7 high quality colleges offering online degree programs in Arkansas.

Indeed, online students can earn their degree at one of the state’s two largest universities, the University of Arkansas or Arkansas State University.

Though students can find some overlapping degree programs at the two schools, each has its specialties. For example, students hoping to pursue degrees in architecture, agriculture, or business may want to consider the University of Arkansas, while those interested in biology, nursing, or political science may want to attend Arkansas State University. It is possible to study these subjects both through traditional and online degree programs in the state of Arkansas.

Find college admissions consultants in your state.

Roughly one third of the schools in Arkansas have a religious affiliation. Student populations at these schools range from just under 200 students up to 5,000. Both traditional and online students can pursue degrees that merge religious studies with fields like chemistry and history.

Tuition rates at each of the state’s 12 private schools vary greatly. Arkansas’s private colleges and schools cost anywhere between $9,000 and $46,000. Many of these private colleges boast high graduation rates and small class sizes.

Arkansas is perhaps best-known and loved for its countless lakes, Hot Springs National Park, and the United States’ only active diamond mine. However, the Natural State houses many higher education institutes where both traditional and online students can earn associate, bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in a full range of disciplines.

With so many affordable schools and competitive on-campus and online degree programs, students attending school in Arkansas have the luxury of combining their individual budget needs with their desired degree paths. For more information on attending school in Arkansas, check out some of the state’s top schools.

What are Arkansas’s Colleges & Universities?

Arkansas’s Best Overall

How do we determine Arkansas's best community colleges?

Methodology

The people affiliated with a school are ultimately what make it great! If you are serious about finding the best colleges and universities for a bachelor’s degree, you should be asking where the most influential professors are teaching and whether their graduates are themselves advancing the school’s reputation for academic excellence in their fields of study.

Most ranking sites rely on an opaque combination of reputation surveys and arbitrary performance metrics. Concentrated Influence provides a ranking that is freer from bias, insulated from manipulation, and reflective of real-world educational outcomes.

To rank the influence of schools, we first determine the influence of scholars and professionals based on the number of citations and publications they have had over the past 10 years. In addition to publications and citations, we consider the web links to and from these sources, and the page views of those sources. We then match the influential people to their alma maters and institutions of employment, so that their influence is attributed to those schools. Our machine-learning Influence Ranking algorithm produces a numerical score of academic achievements, merits, and citations across Wikipedia, wikidata, Crossref, Semantic Scholar and an ever-growing body of data. If you are interested in exploring how and why we rank by influence, explore our methodology in more depth.

We’ve identified 22 community colleges in Arkansas. The following list shows the best community colleges and primarily associate degree granting colleges in Arkansas.

If you’re interested in an online associate degree, visit our best online associate degrees in Arkansas page.