2023 Most Focused Colleges for Wildlife Management in South Dakota

Students have lots of options to chooose from today when trying to decide which college to attend. College Factual has developed its “Schools Highly Focused on Wildlife Major in South Dakota” ranking as one item you can use to help make this decision.

In 2020-2021, 2,449 people earned their degree in wildlife management, making the major the 186th most popular in the United States. In 2019-2020, wildlife management graduates who were awarded their degree in 2017-2019, earned an average of $26,447 and had an average of $23,043 in loans still to pay off.

Across South Dakota, there were 44 wildlife management graduates with average earnings and debt of $33,041 and $24,874 respectively.

This year’s “Schools Highly Focused on Wildlife Major in South Dakota” ranking looked at 2 colleges that offer degrees in a bachelor’s in wildlife management. That schools that top this list have a program in wildlife management in which the largest percentage of students at the school are enrolled.

For more information, check out our ranking methodology.

More Ways to Rank Wildlife Management Schools

Since picking the right college can be one of the most important decisions of your life, we’ve developed the “Schools Highly Focused on Wildlife Major in South Dakota” ranking, along with many other major-related rankings, to help you make that decision.

One of our other unique offerings is College Combat. This tool lets you build your own customized comparisons utilizing the factors that are most important to you. We encourage you to try it out and pit your favorite colleges and universities head to head! If you don’t have time right now, you can bookmark it for later.

Schools Highly Focused on Wildlife Major in South Dakota

The colleges and universities below are the best for south dakota wildlife students.

Top 2 Most Focused Colleges for Wildlife Management in South Dakota

1

South Dakota State University
Brookings, South Dakota

#1 overall quality in South Dakota

$45,741 Average Early-Career Earnings

$25,549 Average Student Debt

You’ll join some of the best and brightest minds around if you attend South Dakota State University. The school came in at #1 for the Schools Highly Focused on Wildlife Major in South Dakota. South Dakota State University is a fairly large school located in Brookings, South Dakota that handed out 41 ’s wildlife degrees in 2020-2021.

The undergrad student loan default rate at the school is 2.7%, which is quite low when compared to the national default rate of 10.1%.

Full South Dakota State Wildlife Management Report

2

Dakota Wesleyan University
Mitchell, South Dakota

$50,275 Average Early-Career Earnings

$34,288 Average Student Debt

Out of the 2 schools in the Schools Highly Focused on Wildlife Major in South Dakota that were part of this year’s ranking, Dakota Wesleyan University landed the #2 spot on the list. Dakota Wesleyan University is located in Mitchell, South Dakota and, has a small student population. In 2020-2021, this school awarded 3 ’s wildlife degrees to qualified students.

The low undergrad student loan default rate of 5.0% is a good sign that students have an easier time paying off their loans than they might at other schools. For comparison, the national default rate is 10.1%.

Read more about Wildlife Management at Dakota Wesleyan University

• Most Focused Colleges for Wildlife Management in the Plains States Region
• Most Focused Colleges for Wildlife Management

Notes and References

References

• 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 our data about colleges.
• Some other college data, including much of the graduate earnings data, comes from the U.S. Department of Education’s (College Scorecard).
• Information about the national average student loan default rate is from the U.S. Department of Education and refers to data about the 2016 borrower cohort tracking period for which the cohort default rate (CDR) was 10.1%.

Read more about our data sources and methodologies

Footnotes

• *Avg Salary and Avg 4-Year Grad Rate are for the top schools only.
• Some schools otherwise deserving of recognition may have been removed from this ranking in the event that new data identified post-publication warranted it, or at the request of the school.

Credits

• Credit for the banner image above goes to Nicholas A. Tonelli.