Best Cook, Restaurant programs in Virginia, ranked by enrollment
Prepare, season, and cook dishes such as soups, meats, vegetables, or desserts in restaurants.
12 schools in Virginia run programs that feed this job, graduating 313 people a year. The job pays a median of $36,750 in Virginia across about 40,310 jobs (BLS OEWS May 2025).
Fields of study in Virginia that lead to this job
Grouped at the 4-digit CIP level. Numbers are graduates per year in this state.
2 programs in Virginia that lead to this job
Ranked by graduates per year in Virginia (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 Virginia page.
| # | Program | Graduates / yr | Share of pipeline | Schools | Grad earnings (1 yr) | Median debt |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cooking and Related Culinary Arts, Generalmain feeder CIP 12.0500In Virginia → | 205 | 65.5% | 10 | $25,404 | $13,000 |
| 2 | Culinary Arts/Chef Trainingmain feeder CIP 12.0503In Virginia → | 108 | 34.5% | 2 | $25,404 | $13,000 |
Top 12 schools in Virginia
Ranked by graduates per year into this job. Graduate earnings are reported for 2 of the 12 schools in this state.
All 12 schools in Virginia
Every school in Virginia 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ECPI University | Virginia Beach | Private for-profit | 95 | 1 |
| J Sargeant Reynolds Community College | Richmond | Public | 54 | 1 |
| Rappahannock Community College | Glenns | Public | 41 | 1 |
| Tidewater Community College | Norfolk | Public | 36 | 1 |
| Virginia Western Community College | Roanoke | Public | 36 | 1 |
| Central Virginia Community College | Lynchburg | Public | 19 | 1 |
| Columbia College | Vienna | Private for-profit | 13 | 1 |
| Piedmont Virginia Community College | Charlottesville | Public | 9 | 1 |
| Southside Virginia Community College | Alberta | Public | 7 | 1 |
| Mountain Gateway Community College | Clifton Forge | Public | 1 | 1 |
| Northern Virginia Community College | Annandale | Public | 1 | 1 |
| Southwest Virginia Community College | Cedar Bluff | Public | 1 | 1 |
What cooks, restaurant earn in Virginia
What people already working in this job earn (BLS OEWS May 2025). Not graduate earnings.
U.S. median $37,390. Virginia pays below the national figure.
1.00× means the state has its expected share of these jobs.
Metro areas in Virginia
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 Cooks, Restaurant page.
How to become a Cook, Restaurant
Job zone 2 of 5 · SVP Below 6.0- Typical entry education
- No formal educational credential
- Work experience needed
- Less than 5 years
- On-the-job training
- Moderate-term on-the-job training
Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not.
Some occupations may need little or no previous experience; others require several months to a year of experience. For example, landscaping and groundskeeping workers might require very little training or previous experience, while agricultural equipment operators can benefit from on-the job training.
Ranges from a few days to one year of on-the-job 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 Virginia
Every major mapped to this job
The official federal mapping behind the rankings above.
All 2 majors mapped to Cooks, Restaurant2 of them graduated someone in the latest IPEDS year. NCES CIP 2020 → SOC 2018 crosswalk.+
- 12.0500Cooking and Related Culinary Arts, General
- 12.0503Culinary Arts/Chef Training
Common questions
Answers for people weighing cooks, restaurant programs in Virginia.
What degree do you need to become a Cook, Restaurant?+
No formal educational credential is the typical entry-level education BLS reports for this occupation. The most common program people actually graduate from is Cooking and Related Culinary Arts, General, which awarded 205 degrees in Virginia in 2024-25, 65.5% of everyone graduating from a program that feeds this career.
Which college majors lead to becoming a Cook, Restaurant?+
The NCES CIP-to-SOC crosswalk maps 2 programs to this occupation. The largest are Culinary Arts and Related Services. Together they graduate about 313 people a year in Virginia.
How much do cooks, restaurant earn in Virginia?+
The median is $36,750 a year (BLS OEWS May 2025). That is 1.7% below the U.S. median of $37,390. 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 cooks, restaurant growing?+
BLS projects a +14.9% change in employment between 2024 and 2034, much faster than average, with roughly 250,700 openings a year nationally once retirements and job changes are counted.
How many schools offer programs for this career in Virginia?+
12 institutions in Virginia reported graduates from at least one of the 2 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 cooks, restaurant work under?+
Employers advertise this work under many names. O*NET records Cook, Line Cook, Grill Cook, Prep Cook (Preparation Cook) among the most commonly reported, all mapping to SOC 35-2014.
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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