Graduate school may be a critical step in your higher education, whether you are interested in expanding your knowledge, learning a specialization, or earning advanced credentials required by your profession. The best graduate schools in Michigan offer advanced degrees, such as master’s and doctoral degrees, as well as opportunities for independent research, mentorships, and professional networking.
With over 80 public and private colleges to choose from, students hoping to earn their associate, bachelor’s, master’s, or doctoral degree can find a program that suits their educational needs and budget. Michigan State University and the University of Michigan are the two largest schools, both serving around 42,000 students and costing $16,000 in tuition. Most of the schools in The Wolverine State, however, serve smaller student populations, with tuition fees ranging from $3,000 to $49,000.
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Additionally, students pursuing their degree at a school with religious affiliations have more than 20 options to choose from, including Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit, Grand Rapid’s Calvin College, and Hope College in Holland. Students attending one of Michigan’s private schools, like Davenport University, can earn their degrees in fields like nursing, education, criminal justice, and history. Michigan, like many other states, also provides a special loan forgiveness program to those in medical, dental, and mental health professions who work in underserved communities. Recipients can receive up to $200,000 of tax-free funds over an eight-year period.
The great state of Michigan famously serves as the major hub of the United States auto industry — and also boasts the longest freshwater coastline in the nation. Students who love the outdoors but are also drawn to the metropolitan energy of big cities like Detroit and Grand Rapids will feel very much at home in Michigan.
To find your degree program, explore some of the top schools in Michigan.
There are 14 doctorate-granting universities in Michigan, 12 of which meet our criteria. The top graduate schools below are composed of both private and public schools that satisfy the following four conditions:
The people affiliated with a school are ultimately what make it great. This is why influence gets at the heart of what is truly best in education. At the undergraduate level, the best colleges and universities are those with the highest concentration of influence. Our Concentrated Influence metric adjusts overall influence by size of undergraduate student body, thus allowing smaller schools to compete with larger schools so long as they have proportionately as strong influential faculty and alums.
But at the graduate level, the combined influence score of a college or university’s top academic influencers is the best indicator of academic excellence. Overall influence, and not influence controlled by other variables, thus becomes the best gauge of academic excellence at the graduate level. Where smaller size is an advantage at the undergraduate level (hence Concentrated Influence), graduate studies benefit from a large and vibrant community of graduate students, who promise to become the new generation of academic influencers.
If you are serious about finding the best graduate schools, you should be asking where the most influential professors are teaching, and whether their graduates themselves are advancing the school’s reputation for academic excellence. Most ranking sites rely on an opaque combination of reputation surveys and arbitrary performance metrics. Influence, as measured by our InfluenceRanking engine, provides a ranking that is free from bias, insulated from manipulation, and reflective of real-world educational outcomes.
Find out more about our methodology here.
Tuition + fees
$17K
Acceptance
26%
Graduation
93%
Student body
45K
Median SAT/ACT
1435/32
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University of Michigan’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$16K
Acceptance
76%
Graduation
81%
Student body
44K
Median SAT/ACT
1210/26
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Michigan State University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$13K
Acceptance
85%
Graduation
57%
Student body
18K
Median SAT/ACT
1105/22
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Western Michigan University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$18K
Acceptance
70%
Graduation
72%
Student body
7K
Median SAT/ACT
1270/27
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Michigan Technological University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$14K
Acceptance
68%
Graduation
55%
Student body
7K
Median SAT/ACT
1185/25
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University of Michigan–Dearborn’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$30K
Acceptance
79%
Graduation
73%
Student body
4K
Median SAT/ACT
1155/24
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University of Detroit Mercy’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$13K
Acceptance
69%
Graduation
64%
Student body
16K
Median SAT/ACT
1095/23
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Central Michigan University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$15K
Acceptance
81%
Graduation
56%
Student body
16K
Median SAT/ACT
1125/23
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Oakland University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$15K
Acceptance
75%
Graduation
47%
Student body
14K
Median SAT/ACT
1080/22
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Eastern Michigan University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$37K
Acceptance
82%
Graduation
60%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1145/24
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Lawrence Technological University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$31K
Acceptance
49%
Graduation
61%
Student body
3K
Median SAT/ACT
1210/25
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Andrews University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$13K
Acceptance
82%
Graduation
50%
Student body
9K
Median SAT/ACT
1050/21
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Ferris State University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
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