Best Labor Relations Specialist programs in Illinois, ranked by enrollment
Resolve disputes between workers and managers, negotiate collective bargaining agreements, or coordinate grievance procedures to handle employee.
31 schools in Illinois run programs that feed this job, graduating 912 people a year. The job pays a median of $104,180 in Illinois across about 3,670 jobs (BLS OEWS May 2025).
Fields of study in Illinois that lead to this job
Grouped at the 4-digit CIP level. Numbers are graduates per year in this state.
3 programs in Illinois that lead to this job
Ranked by graduates per year in Illinois (IPEDS completions). Graduate earnings and debt are national College Scorecard figures reported at the 4-digit CIP level, so specializations within one field share a figure. Each program also links to its own Illinois page.
| # | Program | Graduates / yr | Share of pipeline | Schools | Grad earnings (1 yr) | Median debt |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | CIP 52.1001In Illinois → | 759 | 83.2% | 30 | $49,084 | $26,536 |
| 2 | CIP 52.1002In Illinois → | 148 | 16.2% | 1 | $49,084 | $26,536 |
| 3 | Dispute Resolutionmain feeder CIP 30.2801In Illinois → | 5 | 0.5% | 2 | $41,622 | $21,250 |
Top 25 schools in Illinois
Ranked by graduates per year into this job. Graduate earnings are reported for 5 of the 31 schools in this state.
All 31 schools in Illinois
Every school in Illinois with a program that feeds this job, ordered by graduates per year. Earnings are shown for the ranked schools above; open a school profile for the rest.
| School | City | Control | Graduates / yr | Feeder programs |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DeVry University - Illinois | Lisle | Private for-profit | 359 | 1 |
| University of Illinois Urbana - Champaign | Champaign | Public | 153 | 2 |
| William Rainey Harper College | Palatine | Public | 44 | 1 |
| University of Illinois Chicago | Chicago | Public | 42 | 1 |
| University of Illinois Springfield | Springfield | Public | 42 | 1 |
| Loyola University Chicago | Chicago | Private not-for-profit | 29 | 1 |
| Joliet Junior College | Joliet | Public | 26 | 1 |
| College of DuPage | Glen Ellyn | Public | 24 | 1 |
| National Louis University | Chicago | Private not-for-profit | 23 | 1 |
| Roosevelt University | Chicago | Private not-for-profit | 18 | 2 |
| Western Illinois University | Macomb | Public | 18 | 1 |
| Governors State University | University Park | Public | 15 | 1 |
| Stautzenberger College - Rockford Career College | Rockford | Private for-profit | 15 | 1 |
| Lewis and Clark Community College | Godfrey | Public | 12 | 1 |
| Lewis University | Romeoville | Private not-for-profit | 12 | 1 |
What labor relations specialists earn in Illinois
What people already working in this job earn (BLS OEWS May 2025). Not graduate earnings.
U.S. median $95,420. Illinois pays above the national figure.
Concentrated here: Illinois employs more of this job per worker than the U.S. average.
Metro areas in Illinois
Job outlook
Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Projections, 2024 to 2034.
Growth and openings are national. The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not publish employment projections at state level, so these figures describe the occupation across the whole U.S., not this state alone.
How to get in
The full skills, tools, and day-to-day breakdown lives on the national Labor Relations Specialists page.
How to become a Labor Relations Specialist
Job zone 4 of 5 · SVP 7.0 to < 8.0- Typical entry education
- Bachelor's degree
- Work experience needed
- Less than 5 years
Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.
A considerable amount of work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is needed for these occupations. For example, an accountant must complete four years of college and work for several years in accounting to be considered qualified.
Employees in these occupations usually need several years of work-related experience, on-the-job training, and/or vocational training.
Top skills
The same job in other states
Where else this occupation employs the most people, and what it pays there.
Related careers in Illinois
Every major mapped to this job
The official federal mapping behind the rankings above.
All 4 majors mapped to Labor Relations Specialists4 of them graduated someone in the latest IPEDS year. NCES CIP 2020 → SOC 2018 crosswalk.+
- 30.2801Dispute Resolution
- 52.1001Human Resources Management/Personnel Administration, General
- 52.1002Labor and Industrial Relations
- 52.1004Labor Studies
Common questions
Answers for people weighing labor relations specialists programs in Illinois.
What degree do you need to become a Labor Relations Specialist?+
Bachelor's degree is the typical entry-level education BLS reports for this occupation. The most common program people actually graduate from is Human Resources Management/Personnel Administration, General, which awarded 759 degrees in Illinois in 2024-25, 83.2% of everyone graduating from a program that feeds this career.
Which college majors lead to becoming a Labor Relations Specialist?+
The NCES CIP-to-SOC crosswalk maps 3 programs to this occupation. The largest are Human Resources Management and Services, Dispute Resolution. Together they graduate about 912 people a year in Illinois.
How much do labor relations specialists earn in Illinois?+
The median is $104,180 a year (BLS OEWS May 2025). That is 9.2% above the U.S. median of $95,420. This is pay for people already working in the occupation, not the same thing as graduate earnings one year after finishing a degree.
Is demand for labor relations specialists growing?+
BLS projects a -0.1% change in employment between 2024 and 2034, little or no change, with roughly 5,100 openings a year nationally once retirements and job changes are counted.
How many schools offer programs for this career in Illinois?+
31 institutions in Illinois reported graduates from at least one of the 3 programs that feed this occupation in IPEDS 2024-25. Rankings on this page use graduates per year, because the federal data publishes no enrollment count by program.
What other job titles do labor relations specialists work under?+
Employers advertise this work under many names. O*NET records Business Agent, Labor Specialist, Business Representative, Labor Relations Specialist among the most commonly reported, all mapping to SOC 13-1075.
About the data on this page
Rankings use IPEDS completions 2024–25, degrees awarded per year. That is the closest federal measure of how many people a program puts into a career, because no federal dataset publishes enrollment by program. Wages and employment come from BLS OEWS May 2025, growth and openings from BLS Employment Projections 2024-34, and which majors lead to which jobs from the NCES CIP 2020 to SOC 2018 crosswalk. Occupation descriptions, tasks, skills and tools are O*NET 30.3 (CC BY 4.0, U.S. Department of Labor/ETA).
BLS Occupational Employment & Wage Statistics
May 2025Wages, employment counts, location quotients and metro breakdowns.
BLS Employment Projections
2024–34Projected growth, annual openings and typical entry-level education.
IPEDS Completions
2024-25 (provisional)Graduates per year by program and institution — the ranking metric.
College Scorecard, Field of Study
2020-21 cohortsMedian graduate earnings one year after completion, and median debt.
Census Post-Secondary Employment Outcomes
latest availableGraduate earnings 1/5/10 years out, where the state participates.
NCES CIP 2020 and the CIP-to-SOC 2018 crosswalk
CIP 2020 / SOC 2018Which college programs officially lead to this occupation.
O*NET Database 30.3
30.3Tasks, skills, knowledge, tools, job zone and alternate job titles.
Official source →CC BY 4.0, U.S. Department of Labor / ETA
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