Top 30 Colleges- Highest Graduate Salary

College Search & Selection
1

<p>(In order) </p>

<p>Harvey Mudd College
Princeton University
Dartmouth College
Harvard University
California Institute of Technology (Caltech)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Stanford University
Colgate University
Duke University
Bucknell University
Colorado School of Mines
University of The Sciences in Philadelphia (USP)
University of Notre Dame
Polytechnic Institute of New York University (NYU-Poly)
University of Pennsylvania
Lehigh University
Yale University
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI)
University of California, Berkeley
Brown University
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU)
Babson College
Lafayette College
Washington and Lee University
Cornell University
Swarthmore College
Williams College
College of the Holy Cross
Georgia Institute of Technology
Manhattan College</p>

<p>Anyone surprised?
Top</a> US Colleges ? Graduate Salary Statistics</p>

2

<p>yeah… really surprised lol
Lehigh > Yale !</p>

3

<p>The reason is because Lehigh graduates a lot of engineers, which tend to do very well out of school. That is also why Harvey Mudd is so high. Interestingly Princeton and Dartmouth do incredibly well (top 3) in both out of school and pay after 10 years. This shows the power of the careers and firms which they usually place into.</p>

4

<p>Dartmouth was really extraordinary in this area despite not having a top-class engineering school. It says a lot about the high quality of social networking and closeness to industry of that school. </p>

<p>The biggest surprise for me was Colgate. I have no knowledge about Bucknell, except that buck means dollar. lol</p>

<p>BTW, where is Columbia and USC?</p>

5

<p>Dartmouth has a firm stranglehold on Wall Street. </p>

<p>In spite of its NYC location AND its engineering school, Columbia can’t compete. Now, that’s amusing.</p>

6

<p>Bucknell has a great engineering program. What about the LACs? LIke W&L. What are they doing, lol?</p>

7

<p>List is suprising, especially to see Manhattan College.</p>

8

<p>Seems pretty logical. Surprised Caltech isn’t on it.</p>

9

<p>CalTech IS on it. It’s fifth place. -.-</p>

<p>Also, do note that there are regional biases. Berkeley students will naturally make a higher salary than students from Emory merely from being located in the Bay Area. Some colleges, such as Manhattan College, are some of the extremest examples of such bias. Use this as a rough indicator of educational quality.</p>

<p>

I have no idea why you would expect USC to be on the list, especially after all your negative comments about it not being Berkeley’s peer.</p>

10

<p>Totally missed it. My mistake.</p>

11

<p>

</p>

<p>Furthermore, this Payscale survey, though reflecting geographical differences correctly on more of a macro scale cannot be remotely correct wrt the colleges and universities. </p>

<p>The information gathering of the site is purely bogus. It cannot possibly reflect reality on the college level because it would have to take a snapshot of the varied professions within a college subset. And Payscale is not privy to this info.</p>

<p>Sure, again on a macro scale, the Ivy colleges should make more money over others for those with just bac degrees. But we all knew that already.</p>

<p>Also we know that the Bay Area pays more salary for the same professions over the rest of CA. But we also knew this also.</p>

<p>I don’t think much of Payscale. To put its stamp of approval on information they claim is within ± 5% for each college I think is was, is pure folly.</p>

12

<p>

Well the entire PayScale study is unscientific (much more significantly than even the degree of USNWR). It suffers from the voluntary response bias. I think we all knew that, though.</p>

<p>I’m still inclined to think colleges would rank roughly in the same order albiet with significantly lower median salaries.</p>

13

<p>of your quote:</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>The under or unemployed would have to factor in much more.</p>

<p>The site cites I think it is 25, 50, and 75% medians. A median is less rigid a standard over a mean because a median, figuratively speaking, lops off the low and high-enders. The high and low enders still have a play in a median but it takes a bigger concentration of each opposite to affect, say, the 50% median. (Think of a diving contest with high and low scores thrown out, because the resultant score can be affected by these outlying scores because of, say, national bias.)</p>

<p>Nonetheless, those who aren’t gainfully employed would have to affect the medians because in these economic times there are much more of them. From before, when Payscale reported these surveys wrt colleges, there are some which haven’t had a downturn in median payscale as compared to recent reporting by the site. Yet another bogus feature of Payscale. </p>

<p>I realize Ivy college grads would probably be more recession-proof over non Ivies, but still, there has to be a component in the survey that would take down the median a good $10,000 or so for each college because of the times, agreed. But just as certain colleges would be recession-proof, one has to think that those with just bac degrees would be affected more in these times than those, say, with advanced professional degrees. </p>

<p>As for part (a) of your quote, I would agree also, but not as strongly. I would say the ranking aspect of the colleges would be a 70% correlation between Payscale’s salary findings for the colleges and reality for each, let’s say for the top 200. (But we will never know this will we, so Payscale better hope the colleges don’t question their findings, especially wrt the mix of professions.) Still a 30% correct-college-ranking “error” would be quite high for a site like Payscale, which purports these findings to be highly accurate.</p>

<p>Don’t get me started on USN’s rankings, mainly “garbage in”… ; )</p>

14

<p>“It suffers from the voluntary response bias. I think we all knew that, though.”</p>

<p>So does USNews.</p>

15

<p>

Princeton has a great engineering program though so it benefits from finance + engineering. Dartmouth, Colgate, Duke and Holy Cross are the schools whose reputations in the business world seem to exceed their already lofty USNWR rankings (well at least in the case of Dartmouth and Duke).</p>

16

<p>

</p>

<p>Not so much. US News considers many more factors. Other than the peer and counselor ratings (which granted have a high weight), they are less subject (if subject at all) to reporting and sampling bias.</p>

<p>[Methodology:</a> Undergraduate Ranking Criteria and Weights - US News and World Report](<a href=“http://www.usnews.com/articles/education/best-colleges/2010/08/17/methodology-undergraduate-ranking-criteria-and-weights-2011.html]Methodology:”>http://www.usnews.com/articles/education/best-colleges/2010/08/17/methodology-undergraduate-ranking-criteria-and-weights-2011.html)</p>

17

<p>Holy Cross and Colgate have produced CEO’s for decades and both schools have strong alumni networks on Wall Street. Holy Cross alumni are very loyal to the school with alumni giving rates at 54% higher than most Ivies(with exception of Princeton).</p>

18

<p>Holy Cross and Colgate … what?</p>

19

<p>… regarding your quote:</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Of course USN wouldn’t be subject to sampling biases because USN doesn’t generally sample-size numerous data and report its findings, which isn’t what Payscale does. Again, to scientifically sample size data, one has to actively gain a snapshot of the sampling item in question, wrt the various demographics, etc, instead of passively waiting for information to roll in as does Payscale. </p>

<p>All USN is doing is gathering already accumulated information the colleges have reported to the public, say, via CDS or their voluntarily submitting it to USN. And many (most?) colleges don’t submit information to USN voluntarily.</p>

<p>The problem with the information the USN reports via this ingathering of already-accumulated info, say wrt admissions, eg, incoming students who’ve graduated top-10% of hs or SAT medians, is that the info is either outdated - which USN would deny; comparing apples to oranges among the colleges, eg, superscoring SATs or not; or just plain incorrect, with the colleges willfully inflating or “improving” their numbers to make it appear they are more stringent in admissions than they really are. The top-10%-of-graduating-class % is so inflated by all schools that it isn’t a viable component.</p>

<p>There are a lot of contradictions in the reporting of admissions by all universities. And these numbers the colleges report are not reviewable, so USN runs with this info and takes it as gospel. So it is a case of ‘garbage in…’ for the admissions part of USN rankings.</p>

<p>Add, that USN doesn’t have a graduate-success component. Most of the USN rankings are admissions related, etc, inputs to the colleges. The alumni giving to a university doesn’t denote success because public university graduates aren’t as likely to give to their alma maters as private college grads would.</p>

<p>I actually think the peer and counselor ratings of USN are the only reliable sources the USN has. It is probably the only ‘controlled’ element to the rankings that USN reports. USN actively seeks rankings opinions of the deans, presidents, provosts at the colleges and a decently scientifically sampled counselors’ list, wrt geography, etc, to students who seek admission to the colleges.</p>

<p>The problem with asking counselors their opinions in rankings is, for instance, an advisor to the colleges in Vermont may not know about UCLA especially since it is a public university. He or she may know more about Pomona College than UCLA because he or she has probably had an applicant or more who have applied to PC and probably not to UCLA.</p>

<p>I just find it amusing that so many on this board, who are seemingly, otherwise, really intelligent people would buy into these money-making publications or sites as gospel. As someone said, the USN is a lousy publication that is only in business because of these deeply flawed college rankings.</p>

20

<p>

</p>

<p>Really? Then where is Chapman, Santa Clara, U of San Francisco or Golden Gate University? They’re all located in the bay Area. </p>

<p>

If Manhattan College made it to the top 30 list primarily because of its location, why didn’t Columbia? </p>

<p>

The problem with you is that when I say a school is not as prestigious as Berkeley you consider it bashing already. There are a lot of schools that are not as prestigious as Berkeley yet they’re probably 10 times more desirable schools to go to for college education than Berkeley. For example, Williams, Amherst, Carleton, Shwarthmore and Pomona are not as prestigious as Berkeley, yet every single one of them is more likely a much desirable school for undergrad education. Harvard is way more prestigious than Harvey Mudd or Dartmouth, but as you can see, both schools are performing better than Harvard in this ranking. </p>

<p>Now, I did (sarcastically) ask for USC as most of its students and alumni often sell it as a school with very strong alumni network, and that going there would enjoy the support of its alumni as opposed to a UC school. If there’s some truth to it, that would have reflected on this survey. USC is a smaller school to Berkeley. It would have been much easier to track down their alumni and get better data collection for this survey.</p>