The best communications liberal arts colleges are those with rich histories of influence, proven through the work produced by the program’s faculty and alumni. Beyond demonstrating scholarly impact in the field, the best communications degree programs maximize your opportunities to interact with outstanding communications faculty.
You can turn a communications major into a virtually limitless array of careers. How you use your degree in communications will depend largely on a combination of skills, personal interests, and opportunity. Whether you’d like to edit books for a publishing house, produce a talk radio show, or chase news stories across the globe, majoring in communication can get you started on your way.
Today, top influencers in communication are expanding research on subjects such as the political economy of communication, community media ecologies and impacts on civic and public life, citizen journalism, and much more.
Back to TopCommunications is a popular major because it can provide pathways into countless fields and career opportunities. The study of communication is a balance of theoretical concepts and practical skills. These practical skills are valuable in any field. You’ll learn many of the critical 21st Century skills that employers value such as collaboration, creativity, and the ability to express yourself in a variety of media. Hiring firms actively seek out job candidates with strong writing, speaking, and web-mediated communication skills.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), in 2019, the median annual wage for media and communication occupations was $59,230, as compared to a median annual wage for all occupations of $39,810. And if you succeed as an on-air broadcasting talent, an accomplished journalist, or a noted public relations specialist, you could earn quite a bit more.
Back to TopOnce you’ve declared your major in communications, you will likely be required to complete a set of core courses in a number of related subject areas. While your concentration will give you a chance to choose from a wide range of highly-specialized communications electives, there are a number of common courses that most communications majors will be required to take, including:
Majoring in communication can provide inroads to a wide range of careers in mass media, journalism, writing, public relations, publishing and much more. Your communication skills and personal interests could take you down a wide range of professional paths, including these top jobs:
Related: How to Major in Communications
In pursuing a bachelor’s degree, you will need to choose between three kinds of schools: research universities, liberal arts colleges, and online colleges.
Research universities are colleges and universities whose faculty are active in research and publishing. These schools offer a wide array of doctoral programs, especially in the sciences. They tend to be big, with tens of thousands of students.
Do you prefer a larger university setting, such as largest public university in your state? Research universities are typically big, offering degrees in many different disciplines. Is a big high-powered research environment the thing for you. If not, you should think about a liberal arts college. In deciding on an undergraduate institution, ask yourself what sort of environment will best help you to be happy and excel.
Often referred to as “teaching colleges” liberal arts colleges put a premium on undergraduate studies and offers a broad range of subjects for students to study. A college of liberal arts typically provides smaller class sizes, more direct engagement with professors, and, most importantly, the opportunity to sample a wide range of subject areas on the way to a bachelor’s degree.
Online colleges are typically the same colleges and universities you could attend in-person, but for certain degree programs the college or unviersity has made the degree programs available to be completed online. For over 5 million students, online degree programs allow students to earn their degrees in the most flexible format available. Online degrees are as respected as the on-campus degress you could earn from the same schools. There’s usually no disctinction between the two degrees, and your degree and transcript will not say that the degree was earned online. Online degree programs are offered by a vast majority of colleges and universities, and the number of offering continues to grow. Whehter you are searching for an associate, bachelor’s, master’s, or doctorate, there’s a good chance you can earn your degree online from a respectable online college.
If you interested in an online bachelor’s degree, check out what the best online colleges offer, or search our online degrees for the exact program that interests you. In either case, you will find well respected colleges and universities that offer online degrees.
Back to TopIf you think a research university may be a better fit for you, see our ranking of the best research universities for a bachelor’s in communications.
The people affiliated with a school are ultimately what make it great. This is why we rank the best colleges and universities based on what we call “Influence”.
The influence of a college or university is based on the schools’ top academic influencers related to the discipline in this ranking. We track the influence of faculty and alumni affialiate with these school counting not only the publicaitons and citations of the school’s affiliated people, but we also consider the overall web presense of the faculty and alumni. The greater the citations, authority of web links, web searches, and pageviews, the greater the individuals’ influence. Those combined make up the departments’ influence in the field of study. We believe tracking the academic influence of the people affiliated with a school is the best indicator of academic excellence.
If you are serious about finding the best colleges and universities, 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 misuesed performance metrics. Influence, as measured by our InfluenceRanking engine, provides a ranking that is more insulated from manipulation, and more reflective of real-world educational outcomes.
Tuition + fees
$57K
Acceptance
9%
Graduation
94%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1465/33
Pomona College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$63K
Acceptance
25%
Graduation
88%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1445/32
Vassar College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$58K
Acceptance
13%
Graduation
92%
Student body
1K
Median SAT/ACT
1435/32
Claremont McKenna College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$59K
Acceptance
25%
Graduation
93%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1430/33
Washington and Lee University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$7K
Acceptance
84%
Graduation
55%
Student body
25K
Median SAT/ACT
1045/20
San Francisco State University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$47K
Acceptance
76%
Graduation
78%
Student body
6K
Ithaca College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$10K
Acceptance
38%
Graduation
83%
Student body
21K
Median SAT/ACT
1340/29
California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$58K
Acceptance
17%
Graduation
83%
Student body
1K
Pitzer College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$7K
Acceptance
42%
Graduation
73%
Student body
33K
Median SAT/ACT
1145/23
California State University, Long Beach’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$61K
Acceptance
39%
Graduation
93%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1415/31
Macalester College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$28K
Acceptance
90%
Graduation
50%
Student body
6K
Columbia College Chicago’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$20K
Acceptance
14%
Graduation
60%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1084/23
College of the Ozarks’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$54K
Acceptance
68%
Graduation
87%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1245/26
DePauw University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$58K
Acceptance
35%
Graduation
88%
Student body
1K
Median SAT/ACT
1411/31
Scripps College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$33K
Acceptance
76%
Graduation
65%
Student body
4K
La Salle University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$8K
Acceptance
67%
Graduation
66%
Student body
30K
Median SAT/ACT
1140/22
San Jose State University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$48K
Acceptance
79%
Graduation
66%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1145/25
Goucher College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$31K
Acceptance
91%
Graduation
65%
Student body
1K
Median SAT/ACT
1147/24
Mills College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$55K
Acceptance
58%
Graduation
90%
Student body
5K
Median SAT/ACT
1320/29
Bentley University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$44K
Acceptance
33%
Graduation
67%
Student body
2K
Median SAT/ACT
1194/25
Berea College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$47K
Acceptance
34%
Graduation
79%
Student body
3K
Median SAT/ACT
1370/30
Trinity University ’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$43K
Acceptance
55%
Graduation
85%
Student body
6K
Marist College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$48K
Acceptance
80%
Graduation
81%
Student body
6K
Median SAT/ACT
1210/26
Saint Joseph's University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$55K
Acceptance
58%
Graduation
78%
Student body
1K
Median SAT/ACT
1230/27
Beloit College’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$7K
Acceptance
83%
Graduation
54%
Student body
28K
Median SAT/ACT
1040/19
California State University, Sacramento’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
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