Penn State Behrend has added another notch on its belt after being recognized for its great return on investment ratings from payscale.com, for the 2017 year. Payscale.com is known for recording data that tracks employee salaries; but recently took a look at over 1,833 colleges and universities nationwide to find out which universities had the best returns on investments. Return on investments aka ROI’s are used to determine profitability of an expenditure. According to Robb Frederick the Assistant director of news and information for Penn State, “Payscale assessed the institutions returns by measuring the total cost of attendance, including financial aid packages, against the employability and median salary of its graduates”.

​

The website clearly shows each item taken into account to produce the ROI. These items include tuition for a four year degree, graduation rate, average time to graduate,loan amounts and average salary.Penn State Behrend ranked 205th for in state students, and 255th for out of state students. PayScale’s results showed that Behrend had a 69% graduation rate with the average time of graduation be 5 years. On average In-State students saw an ROI of $405,000, while Out-of-State students saw an ROI of $376,000.

​

These results put Penn State Behrend in  205th place, which may seem low but is actually misleading. The ranking put Penn State Behrend in the top 11 percent of the various institutions ranked. Penn State Behrend saw bigger ROI’s than any other local universities. Within the western counties of Pennsylvania the only school with a better ROI is Carnegie Mellon whos graduates saw a 20 year ROI of $678,000.

​

According to Penn State Behrend Chancellor Ralph Ford, “more than ever, families are paying attention to the cost of attending college, [and]  they expect to see a return on that investment”. Penn State Behrend students who graduate with 0-5 years of experience make on average around $55,200 while those with 10 years experience make on average $93,000 according to Payscale.

​

Behrends high national standings may come as a welcome surprise for current and aspiring students who face some of the harshest student loan debt in history. According to Zack Friedman of Forbes magazine student loan debt in the U.S. is now over $1 trillion. And from his research he discovered that the highest student loan per capita in the nation can be found right here. On average in the U.S. “student loan debt per capita is $4,920”, while student loan debt per capita in Pennsylvania was $5,690. According to Anthony Cilluffo a research assistant at the Pew Research Center, “Only about half (51%) of those ages 25 to 39 with at least a bachelor’s degree and outstanding student loan debt say that the lifetime financial benefits of their degree outweigh the costs.”  Which makes Penn State Behrends high ROI ranking an even bigger accomplishment.

​

Other schools from the region that were assessed included Edinboro University, Gannon University, Mercyhurst University, and Pittsburgh University.