College ROI Rankings

[jennypenny]

Payscale's 2015 College ROI Report that ranks schools by their ROI. Interesting list, and unsurprisingly dominated by STEM schools.

[C40]

Clearly the STEM schools top this list, because STEM degrees have the best ROI. The front page of the list is not shown at a data level that you can draw conclusions from. When you compare a specific STEM school to others than include Liberal Arts and a ton of shitty degrees, of course the STEM School is going to look better.

Near the top, you can filter the list by degree types. This works much better. Of course, if we're talking ROI, a really important figure is how much you're actually paying. (In-state vs out of state, scholarships)

I was surprised by the huge differences in graduation rates. I wonder if they are really measured consistently. It ranges from 11% to 98%. To me, this would seem like a much more important factor than small ROI differences. I wonder if the ROI figures are only for graduates, or for everyone including the drop-outs? (*The elite private schools are at the very top of the list - 95-98%, so maybe the numbers are actually accurate.)

[Kriegsspiel]

LOL... they blurred the logo for Case Western.

BTW... yeeeeaaa, # 336!

[Sclass]

Thanks for this.

Going to one of the top ten and making $900k net over twenty years looks painful. Thank goodness you get more than a check at the end of the line.

[jennypenny]

I was surprised by the huge differences in graduation rates. I wonder if they are really measured consistently. It ranges from 11% to 98%. To me, this would seem like a much more important factor than small ROI differences. I wonder if the ROI figures are only for graduates, or for everyone including the drop-outs? (*The elite private schools are at the very top of the list - 95-98%, so maybe the numbers are actually accurate.)

We've looked at The Mines (#21 in-state, #23 out-of-state). For that school at least, the lower graduation rate is due to a couple of factors. They have a generous admission policy combined with a tough curriculum that weeds out a larger percentage of students. They also lose a number of students who find high-paying work before graduating and opt to take the job instead of graduate. (this was particularly true during the recent boom times in domestic energy production) I can't tell whether Payscale is including drop-outs in their numbers.

STEM colleges are also dominated by men, who tend to earn more and take fewer family-related sabbaticals. That might also skew the ROI numbers.

[workathome]

Michigan Tech representing. Have a few grads in the family.