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Best Value Materials Sciences Schools in California

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2023 Best Value Materials Sciences Schools in California

Identifying Quality Schools at More Affordable Prices

3 Colleges
$14,132 Avg Tuition & Fees*

Finding the Best Materials Sciences School for You

In 2020-2021, 95 degrees and certificates were awarded to materials sciences students who went to a California college or university. This makes it the #135 most popular major in the state.

There are lots of options to pick from today when trying to decide which program is right for you. You can choose a traditional brick and mortar school, or with the growth of online education, you can attend a school half-way across the country without even leaving your house. Also there are many trade schools that offer short-term programs that open up more career options.

Along with in-depth profiles of schools and the programs they offer, Grad Degree Search has created the Best Value Materials Sciences Schools in California to help you in your search for the best school for you. This report analyzed 3 schools in California to see which ones offered the best value programs for materials science 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. More specifically, we discount our quality score by the published tuition and fees charged by a school. This gives the cost per unit of quality for each college. The value is determined by how much quality your dollar buys.

Our calculations use out-of-state tuition and fees in our nationwide and regional rankings. Average in-state tuition and fees are used for our statewide rankings.

2023 Best Value Materials Sciences Schools in California

The following schools top our list of the Best Value Materials Sciences Colleges.

Best California Schools for Affordable Quality in Materials Sciences

$14,417 Average Tuition & Fees

Our 2023 rankings named University of California - Santa Barbara the best value school in California for materials sciences students. Located in the medium-sized suburb of Santa Barbara, UCSB is a public college with a fairly large student population.

In-state tuition fees for undergraduate students at UCSB are $14,417 per year.

UCSB excels when it comes to quality. It’s ranked in the top 20% of all schools on our Best Materials Sciences Schools in California list.

Read More…

$14,226 Average Tuition & Fees

You’ll be in good company if you decide to attend University of California - Berkeley. It ranked #2 on our 2023 Best Value Materials Sciences Schools in California list. Located in the medium-sized city of Berkeley, UC Berkeley is a public college with a very large student population.

The average tuition and fees for an in-state undergraduate at UC Berkeley are $14,226 a year.

UC Berkeley also made our Best Materials Sciences Schools in California list, coming in at #3.

Read full report on Materials Sciences at University of California - Berkeley

$13,754 Average Tuition & Fees

The excellent programs at University of California - Riverside helped the school earn the #3 place on this year’s ranking of the best materials sciences schools in California. Located in the city of Riverside, UCR is a public school with a fairly large student population.

The average tuition and fees for an in-state undergraduate at UCR are $13,754 a year.

Full Materials Sciences at University of California - Riverside Report

Best Value Materials Sciences Colleges in the Far Western US Region

Explore all the Best Value Materials Sciences Schools in the Far Western US Area or other specific states within that region.

State Degrees Awarded
Washington 0
Oregon 7

Materials Sciences is one of 8 different types of programs to choose from.

Related Major Annual Graduates
Chemistry 5,005
Physics 3,727
Geological & Earth Sciences 2,491
Astronomy & Astrophysics 371
Atmospheric Sciences & Meteorology 342

Notes and References

*These averages are for the top 3 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 Per Henning.

More about our data sources and methodologies.

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