2023 Best Value Trade School Undergraduate Certificate Schools in South Dakota
Identifying High-Quality Schools With More Affordable Pricing
When it comes to higher education, there are a lot of options for trade school students. You're no longer limited to schools in your local area, either, since online programs are becoming more prevalent.
To help you arm yourself with the information you need to make your decision, Trade College Search has developed this Best Value Trade School Undergraduate Certificate Schools in South Dakota ranking. This report analyzed 5 schools in South Dakota to see which ones offered the best value undergraduate certificate programs for trade school students. The goal was to highlight schools with more affordable prices than others offering similar quality experiences.
This ranking is not just a list of inexpensive schools. We also consider each school's quality, since we believe a low-quality school may not be a 'bargain' at any price. More specifically, we discount our quality score by the published tuition and fees charged by a school. This gives the cost per unit of quality for each college. The value is determined by how much quality your dollar buys.
For nationwide and regional rankings, we use out-of-state tuition and fees in our calculations. Average in-state tuition and fees are used for our statewide rankings.
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Top Value Trade Undergraduate Certificate Schools in South Dakota
Learn more about these excellent schools below:
Our 2023 rankings named Lake Area Technical Institute the best value school in South Dakota for trade school students working on their undergraduate certificate. Located in Watertown, South Dakota, the small public school handed out 217 undergraduate certificate awards in 2021-2022.
LATI undergraduate students pay an average of $6,718 in tuition and fees each year. Undergraduate Certificate recipients from this school accumulate an average of $10,045 in student debt by the time they complete their degree.
You may have the opportunity to take online classes at LATI. To give an idea of how popular online courses are at the school, 44% of undergraduates took at least one course online in 2020-2021.
LATI also made our Best Undergraduate Certificate Trade Schools in South Dakota list, coming in at #2.
Out of the 5 schools in South Dakota that were part of this year’s value ranking, Mitchell Technical College landed the # 2 spot on the list. Located in Mitchell, South Dakota, the small public school awarded 143 diplomas to qualifed undergraduate certificate students in 2021-2022.
Out-of-state tuition fees for undergraduate students at Mitchell Tech are $7,524 per year. By the time they get their undergraduate certificate, students from this school have racked up an average of $8,371 in student loans.
One thing to take note of is that Mitchell Tech does offer online classes in some areas. In 2020-2021 about 33% of the undergraduate students at the school chose to take one or more online courses.
Mitchell Tech did well in our overall quality rankings, too. It placed #1 on our Best Undergraduate Certificate Trade Schools in South Dakota list.
You’ll join some of the best and brightest minds around you if you attend Southeast Technical College. The school came in at #3 on this year’s Best Value Trade School Undergraduate Certificate Schools in South Dakota list. Southeast Tech is located in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and has a small student population. In 2021-2022, this school awarded 258 undergraduate certificates to qualified students.
The average tuition and fees for an out-of-state undergraduate students at Southeast Tech are $7,650 a year. On average, undergraduate certificate students take out $12,016 in loans while pursuing their degree.
Online courses are available at Southeast Tech, but you will need to check with the school to see if they are available for your field of interest. During the 2020-2021 year, about 43% of the undergraduates at the school took at least one online course.
Southeast Tech did well in our overall quality rankings, too. It placed #3 on our Best Undergraduate Certificate Trade Schools in South Dakota list.
The excellent undergraduate certificate programs at Western Dakota Technical Institute helped the school earn the #4 place on this year’s ranking of the best value trade school schools in South Dakota. Western Dakota Tech is a public institution located in Rapid City, South Dakota. The school has a small population, and it awarded 142 undergraduate certificates in 2021-2022.
Out-of-state tuition fees for undergraduate students at Western Dakota Tech are $8,333 per year. Undergraduate Certificate recipients from this school accumulate an average of $10,399 in student debt by the time they complete their degree.
Depending on your major, you may be able to take online classes at Western Dakota Tech. In fact, around 47% of the undergraduate population registered for at least one online class in 2020-2021.
Western Dakota Tech did well in our overall quality rankings, too. It placed #4 on our Best Undergraduate Certificate Trade Schools in South Dakota list.
A rank of #5 on this year’s list means National American University - Rapid City is a great place for trade school students working on their undergraduate certificate who want the most bang for their educational buck. Rapid City, South Dakota is the setting for this small institution of higher learning. The private for-profit school handed out undergraduate certificates to 16 students in 2021-2022.
National American University - Rapid City undergraduate students pay an average of $16,065 in tuition and fees each year. Undergraduate Certificate recipients from this school accumulate an average of $15,952 in student debt by the time they complete their degree.
Interested in an online degree? Then you definitely want to check out National American University - Rapid City. Every undergraduate student at the school took at least one class online.
In addition to its best value ranking, and one of the reasons why the school is on the list, National American University - Rapid City is ranked #5 for overall quality in South Dakota.
Best Value Trade Undergraduate Certificate Schools in the Plains States Region
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Notes and References
Footnotes
*These averages are for the top 5 schools only.
References
- The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a branch of the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) serves as the core of our data about colleges.
- Some other college data, including much of the graduate earnings data, comes from the U.S. Department of Education’s (College Scorecard).
- Information about the national average student loan default rate is from the U.S. Department of Education and refers to data about the 2016 borrower cohort tracking period for which the cohort default rate (CDR) was 10.1%.
More about our data sources and methodologies.
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