Colgate Alumni Rank in Salary Scale

While Colgate regularly ranks among top schools in terms of how much alumni make on average, this year Colgate is currently ranked 13th by Payscale, a website that crunches the numbers regarding salaries for alumni of private schools. For the past few years, Colgate has been very close to the top of the list, but this year made Colgate’s mid-career salary rank a point of pride for the University.

Payscale’s data reported that Col-gate’s “Overall College ROI Rank” was 33 out of 1248, the “ROI Rank for Private Universities” was 28 out of 458, the “Mid-Career Salary Rank for Private Schools” was 14 out of 606 and that the “Typical Starting Salary After Graduation” was reported at $49,700. The mid-career salary for Colgate alumni was reported to be at $111,000.

“I am delighted to see that Col-gate alumni rank highly in salary surveys,” President Jeffrey Herbst said. “Of course, salary is only one measure of alumni success. Alumni who succeed in sectors that may not pay that much – including the arts and other non-profit sectors – are also a credit to the University.”

President Herbst commented that the accomplishments of Colgate graduates stand as a testament to the quality of the education they received.

“I believe that our alumni succeed, in part, because of the strength of their Colgate educa-tion,” Herbst said. “In fact, the skills and habits of mind that a liberal arts education provide ap-pear to be especially relevant for the 21st century.”

While the Payscale ranking is not a negative in the administra-tion’s view, Herbst made point that it does not serve as the primary motivation of the University.

“Our ambition is to further improve the education we provide,” Herbst said.

Other members of Colgate’s administration were less inclined to give the rankings credence.

“We don’t measure our success or aspirations from these public rankings,” Associate Vice President of Institutional Advancement and Director of Alumni Relations Tim-othy Mansfield said. “The criteria for some of them are very subjec-tive, so my office does not follow Colgate’s standing in them.”

While the latest ranking is complimentary, Colgate admin-istrators do not dwell on the fig-ures for the final say as the meth-ods used to accumulate the data are not always objective.

“The PayScale ranking is one of several ways in which institutions are measured by publications,” Director of Institutional Planning and Research Brendt Simpson said. “When reviewing rankings for in-stitutions of higher education it is important to read the methodol-ogy behind the rankings to fully understand what publishers are attempting to measure. For ex-ample, in the PayScale survey, the numbers reflect individuals that responded to a survey and have an undergraduate degree but not a master’s, law, medical or Ph.D.”

Contact Amanda Golden at [email protected].