Education Atlas

College Scorecard · cost, debt & earnings

Florida Gulf Coast University

Fort Myers, FL · Public · Bachelor-granting · 13,874 undergrads · 63% admitted

Do students finish?
57% complete

A large share of students do not finish; the cost is the same whether or not you graduate.

What does it cost?
$20,807/yr net

Average annual price after grants & scholarships. ~$83,228 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.

$54,560 median, 10 yrs after entry
25th pct $36,485 median $54,560 75th pct $77,458

72% 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.

34 Bachelor's programs · $22,466 to $60,279 (1 yr out)

MajorPay · 1yr outMedian debt
Registered Nursing, Nursing Administration, Nursing Research and Clinical Nursing.Bachelor's $60,279 $17,625
Computer Engineering.Bachelor's $57,910 $21,500
Environmental/Environmental Health Engineering.Bachelor's $54,874 $20,000
Clinical/Medical Laboratory Science/Research and Allied Professions.Bachelor's $54,865
Civil Engineering.Bachelor's $54,799 $17,125
Biomedical/Medical Engineering.Bachelor's $48,944 $17,779
Accounting and Related Services.Bachelor's $47,797 $15,000
Finance and Financial Management Services.Bachelor's $47,707 $19,267
Teacher Education and Professional Development, Specific Levels and Methods.Bachelor's $43,957 $17,989
Special Education and Teaching.Bachelor's $43,114 $24,249
Management Information Systems and Services.Bachelor's $40,361 $19,611
Business Administration, Management and Operations.Bachelor's $39,599 $18,976
Marketing.Bachelor's $38,374 $18,315
Hospitality Administration/Management.Bachelor's $37,359 $19,500
Education, General.Bachelor's $35,552 $18,828
Economics.Bachelor's $34,894 $11,472
Social Work.Bachelor's $34,068 $17,500
Health Services/Allied Health/Health Sciences, General.Bachelor's $33,427 $17,515
Communication and Media Studies.Bachelor's $32,621 $17,479
Radio, Television, and Digital Communication.Bachelor's $32,570 $19,500
Sociology.Bachelor's $31,621
Criminal Justice and Corrections.Bachelor's $31,119 $20,000
Legal Support Services.Bachelor's $30,884 $20,000
History.Bachelor's $29,930 $21,375
Public Health.Bachelor's $29,601 $17,500
Natural Resources Conservation and Research.Bachelor's $29,400 $18,500
Psychology, General.Bachelor's $29,030 $17,245
Sports, Kinesiology, and Physical Education/Fitness.Bachelor's $28,861 $15,000
Multi-/Interdisciplinary Studies, General.Bachelor's $28,803 $18,115
Political Science and Government.Bachelor's $28,595 $19,500
English Language and Literature, General.Bachelor's $28,126 $16,658
Biology, General.Bachelor's $24,244 $21,814
Environmental/Natural Resources Management and Policy.Bachelor's $23,319 $21,615
Fine and Studio Arts.Bachelor's $22,466 $20,650

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
$11,999
22% 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 (43 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