Homeland Security at Dakota Wesleyan University

At $27,000 in estimated debt against first-year earnings around $48,700, this bachelor's program tracks closely with national patterns for homeland security degrees—a debt-to-earnings ratio of 0.55 puts it in manageable territory. Nationally, homeland security programs typically produce median debt of about $23,500, so Dakota Wesleyan's estimate runs slightly higher, though not dramatically so. The estimated earnings align exactly with what's typical across the country's 116 programs in this field.

The challenge with this specific program is that neither earnings nor debt figures come from actual Dakota Wesleyan graduates—they're derived from comparable programs elsewhere because the school's graduate sample is too small for the Department of Education to report. This means you're evaluating the program based on what similar homeland security degrees produce nationally, not on how this particular school's students fare. With only two schools offering this major in South Dakota and no local benchmarks with reported outcomes, there's no state-specific data to clarify whether Dakota Wesleyan outperforms or underperforms its peers.

If your child is committed to homeland security work and prefers a smaller South Dakota school, the estimated financials don't wave red flags—the debt burden appears reasonable relative to typical starting salaries in the field. Just recognize you're making this decision without knowing how Dakota Wesleyan's specific program performs in the job market.