Criminal Justice and Corrections at University of Sioux Falls

The University of Sioux Falls produces Criminal Justice graduates who earn slightly above the national average but lag behind most other South Dakota programs—a meaningful gap given that in-state tuition typically drives college choice. At $38,858, first-year earnings fall in the 40th percentile among South Dakota schools, about $1,500 below the state median and roughly $7,000 less than National American University-Rapid City graduates earn. The debt load of $26,950 is manageable with a 0.69 debt-to-earnings ratio, but you're taking on typical debt for below-typical state outcomes.

The small sample size here matters. With fewer than 30 graduates in the data, a handful of individual career paths can skew the numbers significantly. This isn't necessarily a red flag about the program itself—it might reflect the university's size or the year measured—but it does mean these figures are less reliable than data from larger programs. If your child is committed to staying in South Dakota for law enforcement or corrections work, the state's two larger public programs show stronger early earnings, and those numbers are based on more robust data that better represents what typical graduates actually experience.