SUMMARY
A degree in Actuarial Science is a valuable choice and typically a required first step for students intending to pursue a career as an actuary, a chief financial officer, or a business insurance underwriter. In fact, actuarial science is a ​unique major ranking as the 167th most popular degree. Last academic year, there were 1,633 actuarial science graduates. In-state tuition for actuarial science at private institutions is, on average, 3.7 times more spendy than their public equivalents.
With just 109 institutions having programs for actuarial science there might be limited options as to the institutions you can choose from. If you are looking to immerse yourself with other actuarial science undergraduates, look at schools in Illinois which have more students admitted to actuarial science than any other state. More generally, the best region to get a degree in actuarial science is in the Great Lakes region with University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Ohio State University-Main Campus, and University of Wisconsin-Madison best representing the region. Interestingly, our pick of the top conference to study actuarial science is the Big Ten Conference with University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and Ohio State University-Main Campus representing the conference. Based on our list on the best colleges, our selection for the best university for actuarial science is University of Pennsylvania.
The objectively best school is not necessarily the 'best' school for every student. There can be a bunch more factors to weigh when choosing institution. Things such as campus amenities, transportation services, and food would definitely affect your thoughts of where to go to university. Here at authority.org, we have examined the pros and cons for you. If, for example, you are intrigued by which actuarial science university boasts the best college campus, the winner is New York University. If you are very interested in which college boasts the finest campus, we have a whole list dedicated to that. We have carefully pored through government databases, professor reviews, student reviews, and more to compare all U.S. majors in an unbiased and informative way. Here you can find our well researched list for the universities with the best student life and from that list, our pick of the university with the best student life for actuarial science is University of Pennsylvania. Curious why? Continue scrolling to learn more about our top recommendations. Many of our picks just might shock you.
If expense is a major influence in your decisions, you might be cautious about University of Pennsylvania. University of Pennsylvania is our most expensive university for actuarial science, at least for out of state enrollment. That being said, we have an entire page for the most expensive colleges that could put the cost at University of Pennsylvania into perspective. For more context, you might want to know that actuarial science is the 169th most expensive major in the nation, with an average expense of $32,500. On a broader scale, the most expensive state for actuarial science on our list is Massachusetts with expenses at the main school, Bentley University, of $50,060. Even more broadly, the most expensive region for actuarial science is the New England region which is best demonstrated with University of Connecticut with a cost of $36,466, and Bentley University with a cost of $50,060.
Our cheapest region for actuarial science is the Rocky Mountains region which is represented by Brigham Young University-Provo with a cost of $5,790. On the bright side, the most affordable college for actuarial science is CUNY Bernard M Baruch College. Our full list of the most affordable schools can be found here.
In-state students can anticipate paying in the neighborhood of $10,800 for a degree in actuarial science. The price increases dramatically to an average of $26,400 for the out-of-state public-school undergraduate. On that note, our pick for the school with the best value for actuarial science: University of Pennsylvania. Here you can find our comprehensive list for the schools we see as being the best value in general. That being said, this section is based on being an out-of-state student. The value proposition changes when it comes to in-state tuition, but we do not know in which states any one student has residency.
Earnings for actuarial science students can cover a wide range, but two years after graduation students will often make around $68,000. There can be much variation in salary; top earners can enjoy pay up to $129,600. Even right out of school, the lowest earning jobs within the actuarial science space earn $35,000, which is an alright wage. The top earning graduates from actuarial science studied at Bentley University and if you want to find the colleges with all of the highest earning graduates, we have that too.
The prevailing diversity of actuarial science is pretty high, ranking in the 75th percentile of majors nationally. The university with the highest composite diversity for actuarial science is New York University and here you can find our comprehensive list of the colleges which have the most diversity. The financial diversity of the Actuarial Science major only stands in the 84th percentile of all majors. Racial diversity is even lower in the 69th percentile. White students compose the largest share, 50%, of students studying actuarial science. Additionally, 58% of undergrads pursuing an actuarial science degree are men.
The median rating for actuarial science professors is 3.5 stars, which is 12% below the average for every major; this is a subpar ranking. If you are curious about the most popular actuarial science instructor nationally, consider looking up Constance Cutchins from University of Central Florida. This may come as a shock, but the highest ranked instructors for actuarial science according to students are found at University of Central Florida. As we incorporate data other than basic rankings we find that the college with the best professors for actuarial science is University of Pennsylvania. You can find more detail on our ever evolving ranking methodology of the best overall professors here, along with some of the top instructors nationwide.
Finally, the most difficult school to get into for actuarial science is University of Pennsylvania. While we think of this list more as a novelty, we do have an extensive page of the hardest colleges to get into. With that said, we hope you believe that looking at college through a lens mainly built on superlatives could cause problems. We at Authority hope you read our more focused pages on individual universities and read a couple of Authority's helpful background pages on important things to look out for as your college search develops.