Straight, data-backed answers for future educators
Hakia Education is an independent research resource for people navigating education degrees and careers. No admissions-office agenda, no recruiter spin, just federal data, honest context, and rankings you can actually check.
Why Hakia Education exists
If you have ever tried to research education programs online, you know the landscape: generic listicles ranking schools nobody has heard of, “guides” that are really just lead-generation forms, and salary numbers copy-pasted from the same BLS page with zero context. That is a frustrating way to make a decision that costs tens of thousands of dollars and shapes the next decade of your working life.
We built the resource we wished existed: one that treats readers like adults, cites its sources, and does not bury the honest trade-offs behind a “request info” button. Every ranking, career guide, and salary breakdown here is built from publicly verifiable federal data, and we link straight to it so you can verify every number yourself.
We are the Education division of Hakia, the semantic search engine for degree programs that helps people find the perfect program by meaning, not just keywords.
What we cover
Program Rankings
Data-driven rankings of education programs, from associate's and bachelor's degrees to master's and doctorates, scored on graduation rate, cost, and outcomes, not ad spend.
Career Guides
Honest, step-by-step roadmaps for every education role: what the job is really like, what it pays, and the exact path to get there.
Salary Data
Detailed pay breakdowns by role, state, experience, and setting, sourced straight from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics program.
Guides & Analysis
Plain-English answers on the decisions that actually matter: a bachelor's versus a master's, is a doctorate worth it, how to become a principal, and more.
How we research and rank
Every page follows the same path from federal data to published guide, and nothing goes live until a member of our editorial panel has read it, checked it against the source data, and signed off. The full scoring formula lives on our methodology page.
Primary-source data
Every ranking is built from federal data: IPEDS institutional records (graduation rate, admissions, tuition) and BLS wage statistics. If we cannot source a claim, we do not publish it. We link to the data so you can check our work.
Accreditation verification
For programs that lead to a teaching license, we note CAEP or AAQEP accreditation and state program approval, verified against each accreditor’s directory. State approval is what lets a program recommend graduates for licensure, so we flag it wherever it applies.
Written for real people
The write-ups are drafted from those same federal datasets, then shaped into plain-English guidance for people making real decisions: honest salary ranges (not just the ceiling), the debt loads, the time commitments, and the trade-offs. If a path has downsides, we say so.
Editorial review before publishing
Nothing publishes unread. Every page is fact-checked and edited by a member of our editorial panel before it goes live. That review is where we catch a stale wage figure, a program that has changed its accreditation, or a sentence that reads true but is not.
Regular updates
Pages are refreshed as new data lands, when BLS publishes new wages, when accreditation changes, or when a program stops accepting applicants. Every page shows its last-updated date.
Who’s behind it
Taylor Rupe
B.S., Oregon State University · B.A., University of Washington - Seattle
Taylor built the platform behind this site, from the ranking methodology to the front-end code, and leads its editorial process. The combination of a research background and the technical ability to work with large federal datasets is what makes a site like this possible: the rankings and their write-ups are generated from IPEDS and BLS data at scale, then edited and reviewed by a member of our editorial panel before anything is published. We are honest about that. No one hand-types thousands of program pages one at a time, but no page reaches you without a human editor reading it, checking it against the source data, and standing behind it.
To be clear about what this is and isn’t: Hakia Education is an educational research resource, not a school, a licensing board, or a source of legal or admissions advice. Our authority comes from transparent, cited, publicly verifiable data, not from insider access. Always confirm program details, accreditation, and requirements with the school and your state’s department of education before you enroll.
The editorial panel
Every page is fact-checked and edited by a member of the editorial panel before it publishes. They check each write-up against the underlying IPEDS and BLS records, verify accreditation against the CAEP and AAQEP directories, and flag anything that reads true but isn’t.
Zoe MacDougall
B.S., University of Washington - Seattle
Editor, Hakia Education
Editorial independence
Hakia Education is advertising-supported, and some featured programs are from partners who compensate us. Here is exactly what that does and does not change:
- Rankings are editorial. Compensation never influences our rankings, scoring, or the order programs appear. Ranks come from our composite Hakia Score, full stop.
- We rank accredited institutions. Every school is regionally accredited, and for licensure programs we verify CAEP or AAQEP accreditation and state approval before highlighting them.
- Affiliate links are contextual. When we link to a program, we may earn a commission if you enroll. It never changes the price you pay, and it helps keep the site free and ad-light.
- Career and salary content is non-commercial. Our guides and salary data are written purely for information, with no affiliate relationships.
The full details are on our advertising disclosure page.
Questions, corrections, or feedback?
We read everything that comes in. Reach us at help@hakia.com, or head to our contact page. Ready to explore? Start with the program rankings or find your path.