Ranked #3 in popularity, social work is one of the most sought-after master's degree programs in the nation. This means there are lots of options to choose from when you decide to get your degree.
College Factual looked at 3 colleges and universities when compiling its 2024 Best Social Work Master's Degree Schools in Maine ranking. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 265 master's degrees in social work during the 2020-2021 academic year.
Choosing a Great Social Work School for Your Master's Degree
The social work master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality social work program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
A Great Overall School
The overall quality of a master's degree school is important to ensure a good education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To take this into account we include a school's overall Best Colleges for a Master's Degree ranking which itself looks at a combination of different factors like degree completion, educational resources, student body caliber and post-graduation earnings for the school as a whole.
Early-Career Earnings
One measure we use to determine the quality of a school is to look at the average salary of master's graduates during the early years of their career. That is, everyone wants their master's degree to be worth something, and salaries are one measure of determining that.
Other Factors We Consider
The metrics below are just some of the other metrics that we use to determine our rankings.
Major Focus - How much a school focuses on social work students vs. other majors.
Major Demand - The number of social work students who choose to seek a master's degree at the school.
Educational Resources - How many resources are allocated to students. These resources may include educational expenditures per student, number of students per instructor, and graduation rate among other things.
Student Debt - How easy is it for social work to pay back their student loans after receiving their master's degree.
Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized social work related body.
Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for social work students working on their master's degree.
Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best Social Work Master's Degree Schools in Maine list, to help you choose the best school for you.
Best Schools for Master’s Students to Study Social Work in Maine
Explore the top ranked colleges and universities for social work students seeking a a master's degree.
It's difficult to beat University of New England if you wish to pursue a master's degree in social work. Located in the midsize suburb of Biddeford, UNE is a private not-for-profit university with a moderately-sized student population.
Social Work master's degree recipients from University of New England receive an earnings boost of about $2,218 over the typical income of social work majors.
Any student who is interested in a master's degree in social work has to check out University of Southern Maine. University of Southern Maine is a moderately-sized public university located in the small city of Portland.
Students who graduate with their master's from the social work program state that they receive average early career income of $43,258.
University of Maine is one of the best schools in the country for getting a master's degree in social work. UMaine is a fairly large public university located in the small suburb of Orono.
Students who graduate with their master's from the social work program state that they receive average early career income of $41,771.
The bars on the spread charts above show the distribution of the schools on this list +/- one standard deviation from the mean.
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 the rest 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).
college factual
The social work master's degree program you select can have a big impact on your future. Important measures of a quality social work program can vary widely even among the top schools. To make it into this list, a school must excel in the following areas.
