The Top 25 Colleges With The Best Value

Forbes

From MIT to the City College of New York, these 25 schools send graduates out into the world with high earnings potential and little if any student debt.  Read the full story on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/francescawalton/2024/08/27/the-25-colleges-with-the-highest-payoff/  Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript  Stay Connected Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com  Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.

Transcript

00:00Today on Forbes, the 25 Colleges with the Highest Payoff.

00:07College is an investment, and one more and more Americans are leery of.

00:12Most now say a college degree isn't worth taking on student debt.

00:16A new Gallup poll finds a third of Americans, triple the number of a decade ago,

00:21have little to no confidence in higher education,

00:24with costs, along with politics, underlying this growing disenchantment.

00:29So here's the good news.

00:31There are lots of schools on Forbes' America's Top Colleges list,

00:34which was just released this week,

00:36that actually produce an excellent return on investment.

00:39This is about more than just the sticker price.

00:42Going to a cheap school that produces lousy job prospects

00:45and taking on even a few thousand dollars in debt,

00:48plus the lost time you spent studying, may not be worth it.

00:51Pick an expensive school that reduces the net cost with generous aid

00:55and catapults its graduates into lucrative careers

00:58and your investment could pay off, big time.

01:02To determine which of Forbes' Top 500 Colleges

01:05offer the best return on investment, or ROI,

01:08we looked at each school's price-to-earnings premium,

01:11a calculation by the think tank Third Way

01:14that shows the number of years it takes graduates

01:16to recoup the net cost of their education.

01:19We also factored in the school's debt-to-percent borrowed index,

01:22a figure that Forbes created for the Top 500 Colleges list

01:26that takes into account how many students take on debt to attend the school

01:30and how much debt those graduates leave with.

01:33Combined, these measures gave us 25 schools

01:37that offer a low-debt education and promise high earnings potential.

01:41In other words, a high average ROI.

01:44Some of them come as no surprise.

01:47Science and technology heavy hitters Stanford University

01:50and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for example,

01:53both offer their students stellar ROIs.

01:56Others, like the Nine-City University of New York,

02:00or CUNY, schools on this list,

02:02are less well-known, particularly outside of New York.

02:06Here are a few of the schools on this list.

02:09Princeton University continues to take the number one spot

02:13not only in the Top 500,

02:15but also in terms of students' return on investment.

02:18The New Jersey Ivy League University

02:20offers nearly 40 majors and certificate programs.

02:23The most popular majors are computer science, economics, and public policy.

02:28Over the years, more graduates have gone into the finance and technology sectors

02:33than any other industry,

02:35with business, consulting, and hedge funds also being well-represented.

02:39The median salary for a Princeton graduate

02:42ten years after receiving their diploma is just under $200,000,

02:46and the university's generous financial aid,

02:49backed by a huge $34 billion endowment,

02:52ensures that students graduate with little to no debt.

02:56Stanford University in California

02:59is known nationwide for its focus on STEM programs

03:02and its pipeline to high-paying Silicon Valley jobs.

03:06Many students end up in the technology and startup space,

03:09and within a few years of graduating,

03:11the median Stanford grad brings home $100,000 or more per year.

03:16Only around 5% of students take out federal loans to attend the university,

03:20with the median loan amount totaling $9,851.

03:26CUNY City College of New York, known as CCNY,

03:30is the first of nine City University of New York schools on this list,

03:34and the oldest in the 25-college public system.

03:37It was also the first free public institution of higher education in America.

03:41It's no longer free,

03:43but undergraduate tuition for New York State residents is just $6,930 a year.

03:49Psychology, biology, and computer science

03:52are popular majors at the public college in midtown Manhattan,

03:55and graduates recoup their net costs in just six months,

03:58according to Third Way data.

04:01California Institute of Technology graduates

04:04earn a median salary of $132,140 six years after enrolling,

04:10and for many bachelor's degree holders, two years after graduating.

04:14The science- and technology-oriented school in Pasadena, California

04:18offers its graduates a price-to-earnings premium of $0.73,

04:23meaning it takes graduates about nine months to recoup the cost of their education.

04:28For full coverage, and to see the entire list of 25,

04:32plus the whole America's Top Colleges list,

04:35check out Francesca Walton's piece on Forbes.com.

04:39This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes. Thanks for tuning in.

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