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Best Value Nursing Doctor's Degree Schools in Illinois

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2023 Best Value Nursing Doctor's Degree Schools in Illinois

Highlighting Quality Schools With More Affordable Pricing

19 Colleges
$15,539 Avg Tuition & Fees*
$115,233 Avg Salary

Finding the Best Nursing Doctor's Degree School for You

In 2020-2021, nursing students earned 6,634 degrees and certificates from an Illinois school, making the subject the 2nd in the state.

Today's students have lots of options to pick from when considering higher education opportunities. Along with traditional schools that require in-person attendence, you can attend one of many reputable online schools. Some programs even offer a hybrid experience. Alternatively, you may choose a trade school that prepares you to enter the workforce with knowledge in a specific field.

Along with in-depth profiles of schools and the programs they offer, Grad Degree Search has created the Best Value Nursing Doctor's Degree Schools in Illinois to help you in your search for the best school for you. This report analyzed 19 schools in Illinois to see which ones offered the best value doctor's degree programs for nursing students. The goal was to highlight schools with more affordable prices than others offering similar quality experiences.

When determining this ranking, we place a high emphasis on the school's quality as well as its sticker price. Even though a college may be affordable, it may not offer value. Specifically, our score for quality is discounted by the published tuition and fees charged by the given college. This gives the cost per unit of quality for each college. The more quality your dollar buys, the better the value.

Our calculations use out-of-state tuition and fees in our nationwide and regional rankings. For statewide rankings, we use average in-state tuition and fees.

2023 Best Value Nursing Doctor’s Degree Schools in Illinois

The colleges and universities below are the best value schools for nursing majors pursuing a doctor's degree.

Top 10 Best Nursing Doctor's Degree Schools

Our analysis found Saint Francis Medical Center College of Nursing to be the best value school for nursing students who want to pursue a doctor’s degree in Illinois. St. Francis Medical Center College of Nursing is a fairly small private not-for-profit school located in the city of Peoria.

In-state tuition fees for graduate students at St. Francis Medical Center College of Nursing are $8,740 per year.

Read full report on Nursing at Saint Francis Medical Center College of Nursing

#2

McKendree University

Lebanon, IL

You’ll be in good company if you decide to attend McKendree University. It ranked #2 on our 2023 Best Value Nursing Doctor’s Degree Schools in Illinois list. Located in the large suburb of Lebanon, McKendree is a private not-for-profit school with a small student population.

McKendree graduate students pay an average of $9,756 in in-state tuition and fees each year.

Read full report on Nursing at McKendree University

The excellent doctor’s degree programs at Chamberlain University - Illinois helped the school earn the #3 place on this year’s ranking of the best value nursing schools in Illinois. Located in the large suburb of Addison, Chamberlain - Illinois is a private for-profit college with a very large student population.

The average tuition and fees for an in-state graduate student at Chamberlain - Illinois are $14,090 a year.

Read full report on Nursing at Chamberlain University - Illinois

The excellent doctor’s degree programs at Illinois State University helped the school earn the #4 place on this year’s ranking of the best value nursing schools in Illinois. Located in the medium-sized suburb of Normal, Illinois State is a public school with a very large student population.

In-state tuition fees for graduate students at Illinois State are $9,773 per year.

Read More…

The excellent doctor’s degree programs at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville helped the school earn the #5 place on this year’s ranking of the best value nursing schools in Illinois. Located in the suburb of Edwardsville, SIUE is a public school with a fairly large student population.

The average tuition and fees for an in-state graduate student at SIUE are $9,316 a year.

Read More…

University of St Francis ranked #6 on this year’s Best Value Nursing Doctor’s Degree Schools in Illinois list. Located in the large suburb of Joliet, University of Saint Francis is a private not-for-profit college with a small student population.

The average tuition and fees for an in-state graduate student at University of Saint Francis are $13,839 a year.

University of Saint Francis did well in our overall quality rankings, too. It placed #3 on our Best Nursing Doctor’s Degree Schools in Illinois list.

Read full report on Nursing at University of St Francis

#7

Governors State University

University Park, IL

Governors State University landed the #7 spot in the 2023 rankings for the best value doctor’s degree nursing programs. GSU is a small public school located in the rural area of University Park.

In-state tuition fees for graduate students at GSU are $8,320 per year.

Full Nursing at Governors State University Report

#8

Lewis University

Romeoville, IL

Lewis University ranked #8 on this year’s Best Value Nursing Doctor’s Degree Schools in Illinois list. Located in the suburb of Romeoville, Lewis is a private not-for-profit college with a moderately-sized student population.

The average tuition and fees for an in-state graduate student at Lewis are $14,960 a year.

Read full report on Nursing at Lewis University

#9

Bradley University

Peoria, IL

Bradley University did quite well in this year’s ranking of the best places for nursing students to get a doctor’s degree. It came in at #9 on the list. Bradley is a moderately-sized private not-for-profit school located in the city of Peoria.

The average tuition and fees for an in-state graduate student at Bradley are $17,400 a year.

Full Nursing at Bradley University Report

#10

North Park University

Chicago, IL

North Park University landed the #10 spot in the 2023 rankings for the best value doctor’s degree nursing programs. North Park is a small private not-for-profit school located in the city of Chicago.

In-state tuition fees for graduate students at North Park are $14,184 per year.

Read full report on Nursing at North Park University

Best Value Nursing Colleges in the Great Lakes Region

Explore all the Best Value Nursing Colleges in the Great Lakes Area or other specific states within that region.

State Degrees Awarded
Michigan 1,113
Ohio 2,563
Indiana 1,819
Wisconsin 972

One of 29 majors within the area of study, nursing has other similar majors worth exploring.

Majors Similar to Nursing

Related Major Annual Graduates
Medicine 28,629
Rehabilitation & Therapeutic Professions 24,774
Public Health 19,473
Health & Medical Administrative Services 17,335
Pharmacy/Pharmaceutical Sciences 16,952

Notes and References

*These averages are for the top 19 schools only.

  • 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).
  • Credit for the banner image above goes to Aleksahgabrielle.

More about our data sources and methodologies.

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