Harvey Mudd No. 1 for Return on Investment

For the fourth year in a row, Harvey Mudd College ranked No. 1 in the nation for return on college investment in PayScale’s 2015 College ROI Report, released recently by the online salary information company.

Harvey Mudd tops the overall list with a 20-year ROI of $985,300 and comes in at No. 1 in the three subcategories of engineering, liberal arts and private schools. While gratified by its continued placement atop these lists, Harvey Mudd’s mission remains to provide an excellent math and science education in a broader liberal arts context and to prepare leaders well versed in their fields, says Vice President for Admission and Financial Aid Thyra Briggs.

“Our students work collaboratively across disciplines, excel in all aspects of communication and have extensive technical expertise” says Briggs. “The combination of these skills makes them particularly valuable to employers and graduate schools.”

PayScale economists evaluated data from more than 1,200 colleges and universities and compared costs to median alumni earnings over a 20-year period by summing up the median pay for bachelor’s graduates who earned degrees between 1995 and 2014 from each school, using data over the last year to adjust for wage inflation.

Coming in at second place was California Institute of Technology, followed by Stevens Institute of Technology. Colorado School of Mines (in-state) ranked fourth, and Babson College came in fifth.