undergradly.

Outcomes

Earnings trajectory

Earnings across the first decade (P25 / median / P75)

Census PSEO, bachelor's degree recipients, graduating cohort 0000 (12,246 graduates). Each point is one published percentile, not an average across fields.

Median earnings · 10yr
$50,112
Cost-adjusted: $48,483
Median debt (completers)
$20,500
Debt/earnings ratio: 0.41
3-yr default rate
0.0%
Borrowers who entered repayment in the published cohort year, not current students

College Scorecard. Earnings are measured ten years after entry across students who received federal aid — completers and non-completers alike — not ten years after graduation.

A decade after entry the median student earns $50,112, near the middle of the national range. With the 25th percentile at $29,162 and the 75th at $72,357, outcomes here are about as varied as anywhere else. Adjusted for local cost of living, that median is worth closer to $48,483 — the surrounding area is expensive enough to erode part of the headline figure. Completers leave with a median debt of $20,500 — unremarkable for a four-year degree. A debt-to-income ratio of 0.41 sits right at the threshold where borrowing starts to constrain choices.

Economic mobility (Opportunity Insights)

Mobility rate
2.0%
Bottom → top quintile
Access Q1
10.6%
% from bottom quintile
Success rate Q1
18.4%
Q1 students reaching Q5

Opportunity Insights, students born 1980–1991 — a track record, not a forecast for today's entering class. The mobility rate is a share of all students (bottom-quintile origin and top-quintile outcome); the success rate is the share of bottom-quintile students alone who reach the top. They answer different questions and the second is always the larger number.

Earnings percentiles by field (Census PSEO)

One row per field and graduating cohort. Rows that share a field are different graduating classes, not repeats.

Field Graduating cohort Years after grad P25 Median P75
Communication, Journalism, and Related Programs (09) 2019 1 $24,926 $44,849 $60,738
Communication, Journalism, and Related Programs (09) 0000 1 $24,420 $32,296 $47,119
Communication, Journalism, and Related Programs (09) 2016 5 $36,412 $45,751 $76,015
Communication, Journalism, and Related Programs (09) 0000 5 $32,345 $44,849 $68,203
Communication, Journalism, and Related Programs (09) 0000 10 $51,458 $60,696 $73,228
Communication and Media Studies (09.01) 2019 1 $24,926 $44,849 $60,738
Communication and Media Studies (09.01) 0000 1 $24,420 $32,296 $47,119
Communication and Media Studies (09.01) 2016 5 $36,412 $45,751 $76,015
Communication and Media Studies (09.01) 0000 5 $32,345 $44,849 $68,203
Communication and Media Studies (09.01) 0000 10 $51,458 $60,696 $73,228
Computer and Information Sciences and Support Services (11) 0000 1 $32,743 $43,842 $60,177
Computer and Information Sciences and Support Services (11) 0000 5 $39,998 $66,382 $85,213

Census PSEO, bachelor's degree recipients — earnings measured 1, 5 and 10 years after graduation, unlike the Scorecard figures above. The all-fields institution total is published separately and is not one of the rows above. A cohort label covers a pooling window of three or five graduating years, which PSEO does not publish per cell.

Independent ROI ranking

Georgetown's Center on Education and the Workforce ranked this school #1,211 of 4,419 US colleges by 40-year return on investment — the net present value of attending after costs.

10-year NPV
$116,000
20-year NPV
$464,000
40-year NPV
$984,000

Georgetown University CEW, Ranking 4,500 Colleges by ROI (2022)