SUMMARY
Studying Music Technology is not only a valuable choice, but usually a mandatory first step for undergrads wanting to begin a career as a sound engineer, a musical software developer, or a festival sound director. In fact, music technology is a ​unique degree ranking as the 254th most popular area of study. Last year alone, there were 617 music technology degrees conferred. In-state tuition for music technology at private universities is, on average, 3.8 times more spendy than their public equivalents.
With just 62 colleges offering music technology you may have limited options as to the institutions which will have a degree program for you. If you're looking to immerse yourself with other music technology undergrads, consider institutions in Florida which have the most students admitted to music technology annually. Zooming out, the best region to study music technology is in the Southeast region with Full Sail University, University of North Carolina at Asheville, and Middle Tennessee State University best representing the region. Interestingly, our pick of the top conference to major in music technology is the New Jersey Athletic Conference with Rowan University representing the conference. That said, our choice for the best university for music technology is New York University. You may also want to check out our list of best colleges.
The 'best' school does not have to be the best school for every student. There are many more angels to weigh when deciding on school. Stuff like campus amenities, transportation services, and food might definitely sway your choice on where to go to school. At Authority, we have weighed the pros and cons for you. If, as an example, you are intrigued by which music technology university is home to the top campus, the answer is New York University. If, for example, you are very interested in which university has the finest campus, then we have a whole page dedicated to that. We have carefully pored through student reviews, professor reviews, government databases, and more so we can compare all U.S. majors in an unbiased and informative way. You can find our comprehensive list for the universities with the best student life here and our choice of the school with the best student life for music technology is New York University. Are you curious why? Keep scrolling to learn more about our top recommendations. Some of our decisions will probably shock you.
If expense is a significant deciding factor in your decision on where to go to college, you might be cautious about Stevens Institute of Technology. Stevens Institute of Technology is our most expensive school for music technology, at least for out of state enrollment. We do have a list of the most expensive colleges that might put the cost at Stevens Institute of Technology into perspective. Additionally, you could be interested to know that music technology is the 330th most expensive major in America, with an average associated cost of $21,100. To zoom out a little, the most costly state for music technology nationally is New Jersey at Rowan University and Stevens Institute of Technology, the main schools in the state, of $18,908 and $52,134. To zoom out even further, the most costly region of the country for music technology is the Far West region which is best demonstrated with California Lutheran University with a cost of $43,900, and Cogswell College with a cost of $19,800.
Our cheapest region for music technology is the Rocky Mountains region which is represented by Utah Valley University with a cost of $15,872. In better news, the most affordable college for music technology is California University of Pennsylvania. Authority.org's full list of the most affordable universities can be found here.
In-state students can anticipate paying in the neighborhood of $9,800 for a degree in music technology. That price grows substantially to a median of $21,300 for the out-of-state public-school undergrad. On that note, our choice for the school constituting the best value for music technology: Stevens Institute of Technology. Here you will find our comprehensive list for the schools we see as being the best value in general. That being said, this discussion is based on the assumption that you are an out-of-state student. A discussion of value changes when it comes to in-state tuition, but as we do not know what state(s) you might qualify for in-state tuition, we are approaching this discussion through out-of-state tuition costs.
Earnings for music technology students can differ, but within two-years of graduation graduates will regularly earn around $52,900. While there can be much variation in salary; highest paid earners can enjoy pay up to $105,400. Even straight out of college, the lowest earning opportunities within the music technology space make $27,000, which is an alright wage. The top earning graduates for music technology studied at Stevens Institute of Technology and if you are looking for universities with all of the highest earning graduates, Authority has that too.
The general diversity of music technology lies subpar, falling within the 36th percentile of all majors. The school with the most composite diversity for music technology is New York University and here you can find our general list of the schools which have the most diversity. The financial diversity of the Music Technology major ranks only within the 75th percentile compared to all other majors. Racial diversity is even lower in the 42nd percentile. White collegians compose the largest share, 65%, of scholars majoring in music technology. Additionally, 81% of scholars pursuing a music technology degree are men.
The median rating of music technology professors is 4.2 stars, a rating that is 5% better than the average across every major; this is a good score. If you are looking for the most popular music technology instructor in the nation, consider looking up Mitch Benoff at Berklee College of Music. This might be surprising, but the highest rated instructors of music technology according to students are found at Berklee College of Music. If we consider data other than simply rankings it becomes clear that the school with comprehensively the best professors for music technology is New York University. One will find more detail on our evolving ranking methodology of the best overall professors here, along with some of the best examples of professors nationwide.
Finally, the hardest school to get into for music technology is New York University. While we do not necessarily see the value in it, we have a detailed page for the hardest colleges to get into. That being said, we hope you understand that approaching the education process with a lens mainly formed from superlatives can cause issues. We at Authority hope you look at some of our more nuanced pages on different universities and peruse a couple of Authority's background articles on important things to think about as you continue your university search.