Early Childhood Education at Northern Illinois University

If you plan to study early childhood education, take a look at what Northern Illinois University has to offer and decide if the program is a good match for you. Get started with the following essential facts.

NIU is located in Dekalb, Illinois and has a total student population of 16,769. Of the 227 students who graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Northern Illinois University in 2021, 38 of them were early childhood education majors.

Want to know more about the career opportunities in this field? Check out the Careers in Early Childhood Education section at the bottom of this page.

NIU Early Childhood Education Degrees Available

• Bachelor’s Degree in Child development
• Master’s Degree in Child development

NIU Early Childhood Education Rankings

The following rankings from College Factual show how the child development progam at NIU compares to programs at other colleges and universities.

Note: While rankings may be a good starting point when you're researching a school, they don't necessarily highlight all of a school's strengths. Don't forget to check out the other details that are available for a school to see if it has what you're looking for in a program.

Bachelor’s Degree Overall Quality & Other Notable Rankings

The child development major at NIU is not ranked on College Factual’s Best Colleges and Universities for Early Childhood Education. This could be for a number of reasons, such as not having enough data on the major or school to make an accurate assessment of its quality.

Ranking Type	Rank
Best Value Early Childhood Education Master’s Degree Schools	17
Best Value Early Childhood Education Bachelor’s Degree Schools	28
Best Early Childhood Education Master’s Degree Schools	54
Most Popular Early Childhood Education Bachelor’s Degree Schools	83
Most Popular Early Childhood Education Master’s Degree Schools	88
	95
Best Value Early Childhood Education Schools	104
Most Focused Early Childhood Education Master’s Degree Schools	127
Most Popular Early Childhood Education Schools	181
Most Focused Early Childhood Education Schools	589

In 2021, 9 students received their master’s degree in child development from NIU. This makes it the #88 most popular school for child development master’s degree candidates in the country.

Child development Student Demographics at NIU

Take a look at the following statistics related to the make-up of the child development majors at Northern Illinois University.

NIU Early Childhood Education Bachelor’s Program

During the 2020-2021 academic year, 38 child development majors earned their bachelor's degree from NIU. Of these graduates, 3% were men and 97% were women.

About 68% of those who receive a bachelor's degree in child development at NIU are white. This is above average for this degree on the nationwide level.

The following table and chart show the race/ethnicity for students who recently graduated from Northern Illinois University with a bachelor's in child development.

Race/Ethnicity	Number of Students
Asian	0
Black or African American	2
Hispanic or Latino	10
White	26
International Students	0
Other Races/Ethnicities	0

NIU Early Childhood Education Master’s Program

During the 2020-2021 academic year, 9 students graduated with a master's degree in child development from NIU. About 0% were men and 100% were women.

Of the students who received a child development master's degree from NIU, 56% were white. This is above average for this degree on the natiowide level.

The following table and chart show the race/ethnicity for students who recently graduated from Northern Illinois University with a master's in child development.

Race/Ethnicity	Number of Students
Asian	0
Black or African American	0
Hispanic or Latino	2
White	5
International Students	2
Other Races/Ethnicities	0

NIU also has a doctoral program available in child development. In 2021, 0 student graduated with a doctor's degree in this field.

Related Majors

• Junior High/Intermediate/Middle School Education & Teaching
• Elementary Education

Careers That Child development Grads May Go Into

A degree in child development can lead to the following careers. Since job numbers and average salaries can vary by geographic location, we have only included the numbers for IL, the home state for Northern Illinois University.

Occupation	Jobs in IL	Average Salary in IL
Preschool Teachers	24,120	$31,500
Kindergarten Teachers	4,630	$55,660

References

*The racial-ethnic minorities count is calculated by taking the total number of students and subtracting white students, international students, and students whose race/ethnicity was unknown. This number is then divided by the total number of students at the school to obtain the racial-ethnic minorities percentage.

• College Factual
• National Center for Education Statistics
• O*NET Online
• Image Credit: By Andy McMurray under License

More about our data sources and methodologies.