How We Verify Programs

Which Schools We Checked

The starting list combined every institution that reported bachelor's degrees in social work (CIP 44.0701) to the U.S. Department of Education's IPEDS survey for 2022-23 with every school that has a baccalaureate line in the CSWE directory of accredited programs, captured September 30, 2026 (accredited, in candidacy or in pre-candidacy). That came to 698 institutions. 97 no longer offer a social work bachelor's and 11 have closed; they are left off the site. 1 school blocks automated access to its website and is being checked by hand.

What Counts as a Program

A program is a BSW path you apply to: an online BSW and an on-campus BSW count separately when the school runs them separately (their own page, tuition or admission rules), and so does a degree-completion program built for transfer students. The site includes the BSW, BASW, BSSW and BA or BS in social work. Branch campuses that teach the main campus's BSW are listed as campuses on that school's profile. Human services, psychology, sociology and counseling majors are left out.

What We Read on Each School's Pages

Each school's program, catalog, admissions and tuition pages were read in October 2026 for format, part-time options, credits, how students get admitted to the major, transfer and associate-degree pathways, field practicum hours, focus areas such as child welfare or Title IV-E, and published tuition with its basis (per credit, per term or per year), residency and year. Formats are shown only as the school states them: a program is called online only when the school says it is. Credits that cover only the major are labelled as major credits, never as the degree total. A detail is left out of a listing when the school's pages don't state it.

How Tuition Is Shown

Where a program publishes its own rate, that rate is shown in the school's terms, with its basis and year. Where it doesn't, the listing shows the school's federal undergraduate tuition and required fees for 2023-24, full time, in-state and out-of-state, from IPEDS (the same figures NCES College Navigator shows), labelled with that source and year. The two are never mixed: a program rate is never filled in from the federal figure. Cost-of-attendance and net-price figures are never treated as tuition.

How the Ranked Lists Work

Every ranked list states its measure above the list, and the order follows that measure alone, one program per school.

• Online lists rank by the lowest published per-credit rate the school states for that program, before fees. Rates that apply only to state residents are marked.
• Campus lists rank by the lowest federal in-state tuition and fees (2023-24, IPEDS), the one cost figure every school reports the same way.
• Size lists rank by social work bachelor's degrees awarded in 2022-23 (IPEDS). Size tells you how established a program is, not how good it is.

Advertising never affects a ranking.

Accreditation

CSWE status comes only from CSWE's directory, captured September 30, 2026. Schools listed as accredited carry the CSWE badge (539 schools on this site). Schools in candidacy or pre-candidacy show that status as a label and never the badge (26 schools). A school's own claim of accreditation never overrides CSWE's directory.

Social Work Majors Without CSWE Accreditation

6 schools run a social work bachelor's that CSWE does not accredit. They appear only in a labelled note on their state page, not in the program lists, rankings or tools, because a degree without CSWE accreditation doesn't qualify you for a state bachelor's license or for MSW advanced standing.

Licensing

Bachelor's-level license titles, exam requirements and supervision rules come from each state's social work licensing board or its administrative code (52 jurisdictions), with a link to the page each fact came from. 42 issue a bachelor's-level license and 31 name the ASWB Bachelors exam; 10 license social workers only from the master's level. ASWB's own pages are cited only for what each exam is. Figures are shown in the board's words and never converted.

The Route Into an MSW

Where a school's BSW graduates can move into the same school's MSW with advanced standing, the listing names that MSW and the credits it takes. Those routes come from the verified MSW research on mswdegree.com, matched to the same federal school ID (323 schools). Combined BSW-to-MSW tracks are noted only where the school's own BSW pages describe one.

City Pages

85 city pages carry over from the earlier bswdegree.com because those pages had visitors from Bing or produced leads. Each lists verified campus and hybrid BSW programs by straight-line distance from the city's center (U.S. Census Gazetteer) to each school's main campus (IPEDS), plus online options and the state's BSW license. They are marked so Google doesn't index them, and they appear only in the sitemap submitted to Bing.

Guides and Program-List Pages

Guides and program-list pages are written from the verified program records plus facts read on official pages (CSWE, ASWB, state boards, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Federal Student Aid and schools' own sites). Each outside fact is recorded with the page it came from and the date it was checked, and automated checks confirm that every dollar figure and percentage traces to those records.

Tools

The 5 planning tools filter the same verified program and licensing records. The cost comparison applies the federal Direct Loan limits for dependent undergraduates ($5,500 in the first year up to $7,500 a year later on, $31,000 in total) from Federal Student Aid. The tools run in your browser; nothing you enter is sent to the site.

Pay Data

Wages come from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025: the four social worker occupations (SOC 21-1021, 21-1022, 21-1023 and 21-1029) and the related jobs BSW graduates take, such as social and human service assistants, probation officers and substance abuse counselors, with the number of jobs beside each median. We don't publish job growth projections. BLS doesn't report pay by degree, so pay figures describe the occupation, not BSW graduates as a group.

Who Checks the Site

The site is researched and edited by Taylor Rupe. Program facts and board rules are reviewed at least every six months. Sponsored listings are supplied by advertisers and never affect which programs appear or how they rank. To report an error or a change at a school, use the contact form.