Best Colleges for Ultrasound Technicians

At Orange Coast College, every sonography graduate who sat the credential exam passed it. Three years running, in one concentration, the success rate was 100 percent.

About two thirds of the class sat it. In the most recent year the program reports, 11 of 17 graduates took the abdomen exam and 12 of 17 took the obstetrics one.

That gap is the whole game. A pass rate counts the people who showed up to the exam, not the people who finished the program. Two schools can both advertise 100 percent and mean completely different things.

So this page does something the glossy program pages don't. It shows what each school is accredited to teach, what credential you walk out eligible for, and where the real outcome numbers live.

Sonography Is a Credential, Not Just a Degree

Employers hire registered sonographers. The degree gets you to the exam, and the exam gets you the credential, which is why the letters after a sonographer's name matter more than the name of the school.

The chain runs in one direction. Your program has to be accredited by CAAHEP, on the recommendation of the Joint Review Committee on Education in Diagnostic Medical Sonography.

That accreditation makes you eligible to sit the ARDMS exams. Pass those and you hold RDMS, RVT or RDCS, depending on the specialty.

The credential is what travels. Programs come as a certificate, an associate degree or a bachelor's, and all three can lead to the same registry exam. A hospital certificate holder and a four-year graduate can end up in the same job with the same letters.

Accreditation is specialty by specialty, not school by school. A program can be accredited in abdomen and obstetrics but not vascular. If you want to scan hearts, check that the concentration you want is on the list, not just that the school appears on it.

Every Accredited Program Already Tracks Four Numbers About You

The accreditation standards say outcomes assessments "must include, but are not limited to: national credentialing examination(s) performance, programmatic retention/attrition, graduate satisfaction, employer satisfaction, job (positive) placement."

Programs that miss the thresholds have to open a dialogue with the accreditor and write a plan of action.

And the numbers aren't supposed to be private. The same standards say the sponsor "must maintain, and make available to the public, current and consistent summary information about student/graduate achievement."

Publishing them on a website is encouraged, not required. The standard says a school "should" find a suitable way to communicate them.

That word is doing a lot of work, and it explains why some programs post a tidy report and others post nothing at all. Either way you can ask, and an accredited program is meant to have an answer ready.

Four numbers are worth asking for by name:

• Retention. How many students who started the cohort finished it.

• Test taker rate. How many graduates sat the credential exam. This is the one nobody advertises.

• Credential success rate. How many of those test takers passed. This is the number the brochure calls the pass rate.

• Job placement. How many graduates were employed within six months.

The Same 100 Percent Can Mean Two Different Things

Put two accredited programs side by side and the point makes itself. Both publish their reports, both look excellent, and they're not measuring the same thing.

Both sets of figures come from the schools themselves, in the Orange Coast report and the Mayo report.

Orange Coast is an open-door community college charging community college prices, and Mayo takes a small cohort into a hospital program. Neither is hiding anything. They're just different machines.

What to do with this. When a school quotes you a pass rate, ask what share of graduates took the exam. If the answer is most of them, the pass rate means what you think it means. If it's two thirds, you've learned something the brochure was never going to tell you.

What a School Has to Tell You Before You Enroll

Accredited programs owe applicants a specific list of disclosures. Ask for any of these and you're not being difficult, you're asking for something the standards already require:

• Accreditation status, plus the accreditor's address, website and phone. So you can verify it yourself instead of taking their word for it.

• Admissions policies, including technical standards. These cover the physical demands of scanning, which are real and worth reading early.

• Transfer credit and advanced placement policies. Especially if you already hold a health credential.

• The number of credits and the full cost to complete. Tuition and fees, not just the per credit rate.

• Withdrawal and refund policy. Read it while you still have no reason to need it.

The Programs

Sixteen schools, checked one at a time against the program's own pages. The length column is the professional phase, which is what people mean when they ask how long sonography school takes.

1. Oregon Institute of Technology

Oregon Tech runs a Bachelor of Science in Diagnostic Medical Sonography out of Klamath Falls, with an online degree completion route for people who already hold a credential.

The school publishes a 100 percent credentialing success rate, 97 percent employment and a $70,000 starting salary for graduates. Those sit in a highlights box rather than a full report, so ask for the underlying test taker rate.

Coursework spans general, cardiac and vascular sonography, which is wider than most bachelor programs attempt.

2. University of Iowa

The University of Iowa offers a three year Bachelor of Science through Radiation Sciences at the Carver College of Medicine, and its accreditation carries the maximum ten year award.

You pick a pair of specialties, not one. Tracks combine general and vascular, or cardiac and vascular, so you graduate eligible for two registry exams rather than one.

Admission is selective and separate from admission to the university, which is normal for sonography and catches people out every year.

3. University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences

UAMS runs the only Bachelor of Science specific to sonography in Arkansas, through its College of Health Professions, with campuses in Little Rock and Fayetteville.

The program is accredited by CAAHEP on the recommendation of the JRC-DMS, and students choose between general and cardiac tracks.

Two sites, one program. The northwest regional campus opened to spread access across the state, so check which site has seats before you plan a move.

4. Bellevue College

Bellevue College near Seattle runs a Diagnostic Ultrasound Technology program at associate level, and it's accredited in all four concentrations: adult cardiac, abdomen-extended, obstetrics and gynecology, and vascular.

That breadth at a public two year price is unusual. Many associate programs carry one or two concentrations, not four.

Graduates sit the ARDMS specialty exams under Prerequisite Pathway 2, and the college also offers a bachelor completion route in radiation and imaging sciences.

5. Rush University

Rush in Chicago runs two separate sonography bachelor degrees, one in Diagnostic Medical Sonography and one in Vascular Ultrasound. Older lists usually mention only the vascular one.

The vascular degree is genuinely rare. Few programs in the country are built entirely around vascular work, and clinical training happens inside Rush University Medical Center.

Rush publishes a full program effectiveness report, which puts it in the minority on this page and makes it easy to check before you apply.

6. Johns Hopkins Schools of Medical Imaging

Read the name carefully, because it isn't the university. The sonography program belongs to The Johns Hopkins Hospital Schools of Medical Imaging. Johns Hopkins University doesn't award an undergraduate sonography degree, and lists that say otherwise have blurred the two.

What you get is a hospital based certificate program, accredited by CAAHEP on the JRC-DMS recommendation, with clinical rotations inside the hospital.

For someone who already holds a degree and wants the credential, that route is often faster than starting another bachelor.

7. Rochester Institute of Technology

RIT runs a four year Bachelor of Science that ends in a full year of clinical internship, and it's one of the few bachelor level sonography degrees in the country.

Accreditation covers abdominal-extended, obstetrics and gynecology, and adult cardiac, and the cardiac concentration was added more recently than the general one.

RIT publishes its program effectiveness data as a standing document, so retention and placement are there to read rather than to request.

8. University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

At UW-Milwaukee the degree is a Bachelor of Science in Biomedical Sciences with a diagnostic medical sonography major, which is why it can be hard to find in a course catalog.

The last two years happen off campus. After four or more semesters of preclinical work, students train at one of three clinical affiliates: Froedtert Hospital, Advocate Aurora St. Luke's, or UW Hospital and Clinics in Madison.

So admission to the major is a second gate after admission to the university, and the site you land at shapes your clinical experience.

9. Thomas Jefferson University

Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia runs three separate sonography concentrations, general, vascular and cardiac, and each one holds a full ten year continuation of accreditation.

Ten years is the longest award CAAHEP grants. Getting it on three concentrations at once says the department has been stable for a while.

Depending on the concentration, your exam comes from ARDMS, Cardiovascular Credentialing International or ARRT, and the program updates its effectiveness data every year.

10. Cleveland Clinic

There are two programs here, not one. The Beachwood program runs 21 months across five semesters, and the Mercy program in Canton is a twelve month hospital based diploma.

Both sit under the School of Health Professions, not a school of medical imaging, whatever older lists say.

Both are CAAHEP accredited, and training happens inside Cleveland Clinic facilities.

Twelve months is about as short as this field gets, so the Mercy route suits someone who needs to be earning quickly and can handle the pace.

11. Nova Southeastern University

Nova Southeastern also runs two sonography bachelors, one in Cardiovascular Sonography and one in Medical Sonography, both out of the College of Allopathic Medicine in Florida.

The cardiovascular degree is accredited in adult echocardiography and non-invasive vascular, so graduates can sit registry exams in both.

More than 800 lab hours before you reach the clinic. The school reports employment at 100 percent and registry pass rates "up to 100 percent," which is its own phrasing and worth pinning down to a specific year and cohort when you ask.

12. Mayo Clinic School of Health Sciences

Mayo runs its 21 month Sonography Program in Rochester, Minnesota and Jacksonville, Florida, covering abdomen-extended, obstetrics and gynecology, and vascular.

Its published report is the strongest on this page. Retention averages 97 percent at Rochester, job placement is 100 percent at both sites, and every single graduate sat the credential exams, which is what makes its success rates of 94 to 100 percent mean something.

You can enter for a certificate or toward a bachelor. The certificate takes you straight to the exam, and the bachelor route runs through an affiliated academic institution first.

13. Grand Valley State University

Grand Valley State runs a 21 month cohort program in Michigan that starts each fall, leading to a Bachelor of Science in Diagnostic Medical Sonography.

You reach the exam before you graduate. Students become eligible for ARDMS exams after completing 1,680 contact hours, which lands in November or December of senior year, with graduation the following April.

The university runs a separate cardiovascular sonography program too, so check which one matches the scanning you want to do.

14. Ferris State University

Ferris State offers an Associate of Applied Science in Diagnostic Medical Sonography, accredited by CAAHEP on the JRC-DMS recommendation.

Clinical internship fills the last three semesters, and graduates sit the physics exam plus the abdomen and obstetrics specialty exams.

Between Ferris and Grand Valley, Michigan students have both an associate and a bachelor route without leaving the state.

15. Cuyahoga Community College

Tri-C, formally Cuyahoga Community College, runs an associate program in Cleveland accredited through July 2029 in all four concentrations: adult cardiac, abdominal extended, obstetrics and gynecology, and vascular.

You pick your specialty inside the cohort. Students train in adult echocardiography, vascular, or abdominal extended with obstetrics and gynecology.

Community college tuition with four accredited concentrations is a combination worth knowing about if you're anywhere near northeast Ohio.

16. Orange Coast College

Orange Coast College in California runs an associate program accredited in abdomen-extended and obstetrics and gynecology, and it publishes the clearest numbers on this page.

Retention averages 79 percent over three years, job placement 93 percent, and credential success 100 percent in abdomen and 97 percent in obstetrics. The test taker rate sits at 65 and 71 percent.

That isn't a criticism, it's a service. The program publishes the number most schools leave out, which is the only reason this page could show you what a pass rate really rests on.

Three Schools You May Have Seen That Don't Belong Here

Sonography lists copy each other, and a few names have travelled a long way without anyone checking. If you're cross-referencing this page against another one, these three come up often:

• George Washington University. GW's own bulletin lists three undergraduate health sciences degrees, in clinical embryology, medical genetics and medical laboratory science. Sonography isn't among them.

• Michigan State University. Ultrasound at MSU sits inside the radiology department's medical training. There's no sonography program to apply to. Michigan's programs are at Grand Valley State, Ferris State and Lake Michigan College.

• Midwestern State University. The Radiologic Sciences degree is a completion program for technologists who already hold ARRT registration, and the school's accreditation is JRCERT for radiologic technology, not CAAHEP for sonography.

None of these are bad schools. They just don't run the program, and applying to one because a list said so costs you a cycle.

How to Check Any Program in Ten Minutes

Open the CAAHEP directory and find the program by name. Note which concentrations are listed, because that's the part that decides what exams you can sit.

Then look for a program effectiveness report on the school's site. If you find one, read the test taker rate before the pass rate. If you can't find one, email and ask, and remember the standards say the school has to make that summary available.

Sonography is a two to four year commitment for a credential you carry for the rest of your career. It's worth an afternoon of checking.

If you're still comparing health careers, our guides to what you can do with a nursing degree and careers you can start without a four year college put this one next to the alternatives.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long does it take to become an ultrasound technician?

Twelve months to four years, depending on the route. Hospital diploma programs run about a year, associate degrees about two, and bachelor degrees three or four. All of them can lead to the same registry exam.

Do I need a bachelor degree to work as a sonographer?

No. Employers hire on the credential, and certificate, associate and bachelor graduates all sit the same ARDMS exams. A bachelor helps later if you want to move into management, education or an advanced imaging role.

What does CAAHEP accreditation get me?

Eligibility. Graduating from a CAAHEP accredited program is the cleanest path to the ARDMS exams, and most hospitals expect it. Accreditation is granted per concentration, so check that the specialty you want is covered.

Is a 100 percent pass rate a good sign?

Only alongside the test taker rate. A program where every graduate sits the exam and 94 percent pass is stronger than one where two thirds sit it and all of them pass. Ask for both numbers together.

Can I get the outcome numbers if a school doesn't publish them?

Yes, ask the program director. The accreditation standards require the sponsor to maintain summary information on student and graduate achievement and make it available to the public.

Which specialty should I pick?

Start with what is accredited near you, because that limits the real choice more than preference does. General sonography covers abdomen and obstetrics, vascular covers blood vessels, and cardiac covers the heart. Several programs let you qualify in two.