2023 Best Value Colleges for Natural Sciences in the Far Western US Region

It’s not easy to decide which college to attend when there so many options available for students. At College Factual, we’re committed to helping you make that decision by providing information such as that found in our “Best Value Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region” ranking.

In 2020-2021, 2,214 people earned their degree in natural sciences, making the major the 208th most popular in the United States. In 2019-2020, natural sciences graduates who were awarded their degree in 2017-2019, earned an average of $25,745 and had an average of $18,648 in loans still to pay off.

Across the Far Western US region, there were 338 natural sciences graduates with average earnings and debt of $21,994 and $13,778 respectively.

For this year’s “Best Value Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region” ranking, we looked at 2 colleges that offer a degree in natural sciences. Not only do the schools that top this list have excellent natural sciences programs, but they also cost less that schools of similar quality.

Some of the factors we look at when determining these rankings are overall quality of the natural sciences program at the school and the cost of the school after aid is awarded among other things. For more information, check out our ranking methodology.

One Size Does Not Fit All

When choosing the right school for you, it’s important to arm yourself with all the facts you can. To that end, we’ve created a number of major-specific rankings, including this “Best Value Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region” list to help you make the college decision.

We’ve created a tool called College Combat that lets you create your own customized comparisons based on the factors that matter the most to you. Go ahead and give it a try, or bookmark the link so you can check it out later.

Best Value Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region

The following schools top our list of the Best Best Value Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region.

Top 2 Best Value Colleges for Natural Sciences in the Far Western US Region

1

University of Alaska Fairbanks
Fairbanks, Alaska

#2 in overall quality

$10,510 Average Net Price

$45,077 Average Early-Career Earnings

Out of the 2 schools in the Best Value Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region that were part of this year’s ranking, University of Alaska Fairbanks landed the #1 spot on the list. Fairbanks, Alaska is the setting for this medium-sized institution of higher learning. The public school handed out ’s natural sciences degrees to 14 students in 2020-2021.

As a testament to the quality of education offered at UAF, the school also landed the #2 spot in our “Best Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region” ranking. The yearly cost to attend University of Alaska Fairbanks is $10,510 for far western us region natural sciences students.

Full UAF Natural Sciences Report

2

Loyola Marymount University
Los Angeles, California

#1 in overall quality

$44,467 Average Net Price

$48,301 Average Early-Career Earnings

You’ll be in good company if you decide to attend Loyola Marymount University. It ranked #2 on our 2023 Best Value Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region list. Los Angeles, California is the setting for this fairly large institution of higher learning. The private not-for-profit school handed out ’s natural sciences degrees to 48 students in 2020-2021.

Loyola Marymount did well in our major quality rankings, too. It placed #1 on our “Best Natural Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Region” list. It costs about $44,467 for Far Western US Region Natural Sciences students per year to attend Loyola Marymount.

The impressive undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio of 10 to 1 means that students may have more opportunities to work more closely with their professors than they would at other schools. The low undergrad student loan default rate of 1.8% 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%.

Full Loyola Marymount University Natural Sciences Report

• Best Value Colleges for Natural Sciences

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

• *Average salary, average net price, and average tuition and fees 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 Agsftw.