What Colleges Offer the Right Majors?

How can you find schools that offer the college degree that you want?
That was the question that I got from a mother whose daughter hopes to become a registered nurse. The mom asked me  how her daughter could find a list of colleges and universities that offer nursing degrees. (Nursing, by the way, is the most popular major in the United States after business and accounting.)
This is a common question and the answer is relevant to anybody who wants to cast a wider net when looking for colleges. Luckily, it isn’t hard at all to develop a list of schools by college major. The resource that I referred her to was the federal College Navigator, which is a massive depository of information on thousands of colleges and universities.
To find a list of schools in a particular major you want to head to the College Navigator’s home page. Here’s what you’ll see:

When you’re on the site, look on the left hand side and click on the rectangle that says Browse for Programs.

In this case, I typed in nursing, which produced lots of different nursing majors. You must click the +add button to include the majors in your search.

To narrow your search you can designate that you want public or private schools and two-year or four-year schools. In my search, I selected private non-profit and public universities. You can also narrow your search by focusing on certain states. To choose by states, click on the Use Map icon. In this example, I selected 8 states in the Midwest. Yellow pins on the map designate the states that I picked.

Based on my criteria, I ultimately obtained a list of 160 Midwestern schools that have nursing programs. By clicking on each school’s hyperlink, you will find lots of information about the institution. Here is the beginning of the list of Midwestern nursing schools:

Bottom Line: You can find college and universities that offer any college majors that you are interested in by using the federal College Navigator. So check it out!
Does anybody else have suggestions on how to research majors? If so, please use the comment box below. I’d love to hear from you!
Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of The College Solution and she also writes college blogs for CBSMoneyWatch and US News & World Report. Follow her on Twitter.

Read More on The College Solution:

5 Tips on Choosing a College Major
Why Not Major in Philosophy?
College Majors: What the Scottish Can Tell Us
Stressing About College Majors