U.S. News evaluated online bachelor’s and master’s programs on various criteria, including student engagement.
Bachelor's: Students pursuing a bachelor's degree online are largely motivated by careers—either advancing in their current field or changing careers altogether, the Learning House survey notes. In turn, the most popular majors for online students at the undergraduate level have distinct career tracks. Those majors include business administration and management, accounting, information technology, finance, and nursing.
While Pace earned the distinction of the best online bachelor's degree program, Daytona State College in Florida and St. John's University also performed well, coming in second and third, respectively. Westfield State University (No. 4) in Massachusetts and Graceland University (No. 5) in Iowa rounded out the top of the virtual undergraduate programs rankings.
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Business (master's): In addition to Washington State, other top performing online graduate business/MBA programs include Arizona State University's Carey School of Business (No. 2), Indiana University—Bloomington's Kelley School of Business (No. 3), University of Florida's Hough Graduate School of Business (No. 4), and California State University—Fullerton's Mihaylo College of Business and Economics (No. 5).
Engineering (master's): The five best online graduate engineering programs are University of Southern California's Viterbi School of Engineering, Pennsylvania State University—World Campus, Columbia University's Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science, Purdue University—West Lafayette, and the University of Michigan—Ann Arbor.
Computer Information Technology (master's): The University of Southern California also claimed the top spot for its online CIT program, with Sam Houston State University in Texas coming in second. Virginia Tech earned the No. 3 spot, followed by the University of Bridgeport in Connecticut and Pennsylvania State University—World Campus. The CIT category includes master's programs in computer science and computer engineering.
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