Education Atlas

College Scorecard · cost, debt & earnings

Boise State University

Boise, ID · Public · Bachelor-granting · 17,674 undergrads · 87% admitted

Do students finish?
60% complete

Most students who start here finish.

What does it cost?
$28,224/yr net

Average annual price after grants & scholarships. ~$112,896 over four years if you finish on time.

What former students go on to earn

The middle 50% of students who received federal aid, measured 10 years after they entered (an earlier entering class — not a guarantee, and not limited to those who graduated). Earnings vary enormously by field of study.

$51,658 median, 10 yrs after entry
25th pct $32,650 median $51,658 75th pct $76,483

67% earn more than a typical high-school graduate (the dashed line above, $28,000 — a fixed, somewhat dated federal benchmark) ten years on.

Your major matters more than your school

The school-wide figure above blends every major together — but pay varies enormously by program. Pick a degree level (and search your major) to compare like-for-like.

Read these on their own terms. Program pay is measured 1 year after completing the program (early career, graduates only) — not the same as the school-wide number above, which is 10 years after a student first enrolled. Don't compare a program figure to the school figure; use the programs to compare majors to each other.

39 Bachelor's programs · $20,885 to $73,319 (1 yr out)

MajorPay · 1yr outMedian debt
Electrical, Electronics, and Communications Engineering.Bachelor's $73,319 $32,250
Computer Science.Bachelor's $70,923 $26,000
Construction Management.Bachelor's $68,628 $23,250
Materials Engineering.Bachelor's $68,028 $21,500
Registered Nursing, Nursing Administration, Nursing Research and Clinical Nursing.Bachelor's $66,061 $17,033
Mechanical Engineering.Bachelor's $61,725 $24,667
Allied Health Diagnostic, Intervention, and Treatment Professions.Bachelor's $61,487 $16,551
Civil Engineering.Bachelor's $54,345 $26,880
Computer and Information Sciences, General.Bachelor's $48,480 $13,550
Accounting and Related Services.Bachelor's $45,367 $20,970
Finance and Financial Management Services.Bachelor's $45,360 $20,000
Business Administration, Management and Operations.Bachelor's $43,652 $21,000
Marketing.Bachelor's $39,135 $20,500
Business/Commerce, General.Bachelor's $38,928 $19,900
Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies, Other.Bachelor's $37,723 $21,324
Multi-/Interdisciplinary Studies, General.Bachelor's $36,016 $24,051
Special Education and Teaching.Bachelor's $35,812 $25,000
International Business.Bachelor's $34,651 $25,002
Social Work.Bachelor's $34,474 $21,929
Teacher Education and Professional Development, Specific Levels and Methods.Bachelor's $34,120 $22,177
Geological and Earth Sciences/Geosciences.Bachelor's $34,068 $25,360
Teacher Education and Professional Development, Specific Subject Areas.Bachelor's $33,906 $24,547
Criminal Justice and Corrections.Bachelor's $33,886 $20,375
Communication and Media Studies.Bachelor's $33,023 $20,500
Sociology.Bachelor's $31,463 $23,635
Physics.Bachelor's $31,275 $24,469
Political Science and Government.Bachelor's $30,918 $20,600
Anthropology.Bachelor's $30,855 $25,475
Health Professions and Related Clinical Sciences, Other.Bachelor's $29,293 $22,953
Natural Resources Conservation and Research.Bachelor's $27,517 $18,616
Sports, Kinesiology, and Physical Education/Fitness.Bachelor's $27,486 $21,500
Social Sciences, General.Bachelor's $27,337 $23,900
Design and Applied Arts.Bachelor's $26,706 $26,618
History.Bachelor's $25,921 $23,500
Romance Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics.Bachelor's $25,576 $22,708
Biology, General.Bachelor's $24,915 $20,096
English Language and Literature, General.Bachelor's $24,643 $24,618
Psychology, General.Bachelor's $24,213 $20,399
Drama/Theatre Arts and Stagecraft.Bachelor's $20,885

The Dept. of Education omits programs with too few graduates (to protect privacy), so not every major appears. Pay is a median for federally-aided graduates. Full program detail on the official Scorecard.

Typical federal loan debt
$14,000
27% of one year's typical earnings here

This counts federal student loans only — not private loans, Parent PLUS loans, or family savings, so the true cost of borrowing is usually higher. And because students who drop out borrow less, a school where many students don't finish can show a deceptively low debt figure — read it next to the completion rate above.

What these numbers are — and are not

Every figure here is an institution-wide median from the U.S. Dept. of Education College Scorecard. It is not a prediction of what you would earn or owe — a computer-science and a fine-arts graduate of the same school can earn wildly different amounts, and your field of study matters more than your school. It is not a figure for any one program, not proof the school caused the outcome (selective schools admit students who would earn more anyway), and not a "best college" ranking. Earnings and debt cover federally-aided students.

→ The number that actually answers "worth it" is earnings by major — see the by-major breakdown above (54 programs at this school).

Also available: structured data (JSON-LD) · plain text · JSON. Source: U.S. Dept. of Education College Scorecard (2026-06-10 release). · school website