Education Atlas

College Scorecard · cost, debt & earnings

Portland State University

Portland, OR · Public · Bachelor-granting · 13,182 undergrads · 91% admitted

Do students finish?
53% complete

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

What does it cost?
$21,590/yr net

Average annual price after grants & scholarships. ~$86,360 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.

$57,906 median, 10 yrs after entry
25th pct $33,117 median $57,906 75th pct $85,203

73% 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.

52 Bachelor's programs · $21,507 to $81,059 (1 yr out)

MajorPay · 1yr outMedian debt
Computer Engineering.Bachelor's $81,059 $25,000
Computer Science.Bachelor's $76,452 $25,000
Electrical, Electronics, and Communications Engineering.Bachelor's $72,696 $23,875
Mechanical Engineering.Bachelor's $62,670 $23,000
Civil Engineering.Bachelor's $61,483 $22,470
Environmental/Environmental Health Engineering.Bachelor's $55,612 —
Finance and Financial Management Services.Bachelor's $49,432 $16,444
Accounting and Related Services.Bachelor's $47,209 $23,000
Business Administration, Management and Operations.Bachelor's $46,148 $19,901
General Sales, Merchandising and Related Marketing Operations.Bachelor's $44,849 —
Chemistry.Bachelor's $44,198 $24,000
Human Resources Management and Services.Bachelor's $44,051 $18,791
Business, Management, Marketing, and Related Support Services, Other.Bachelor's $39,501 $18,000
Biochemistry, Biophysics and Molecular Biology.Bachelor's $39,299 $22,221
Marketing.Bachelor's $36,870 $18,000
Communication and Media Studies.Bachelor's $36,472 $20,499
Design and Applied Arts.Bachelor's $36,317 $23,100
Criminal Justice and Corrections.Bachelor's $36,250 $22,630
Mathematics.Bachelor's $35,768 $20,834
Geological and Earth Sciences/Geosciences.Bachelor's $35,657 $21,253
Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies, Other.Bachelor's $33,967 $16,476
Slavic, Baltic and Albanian Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics.Bachelor's $33,771 —
Architecture.Bachelor's $32,692 $25,000
Public Health.Bachelor's $32,558 $21,500
Economics.Bachelor's $32,245 $20,000
Biological and Physical Sciences.Bachelor's $32,021 $21,720
Liberal Arts and Sciences, General Studies and Humanities.Bachelor's $31,991 $22,604
Social Sciences, General.Bachelor's $31,905 $21,914
Political Science and Government.Bachelor's $31,308 $19,083
Biology, General.Bachelor's $30,441 $22,750
Psychology, General.Bachelor's $30,278 $19,655
Human Development, Family Studies, and Related Services.Bachelor's $30,216 $20,750
Health and Medical Administrative Services.Bachelor's $29,851 —
Social Work.Bachelor's $29,548 $23,000
Community Organization and Advocacy.Bachelor's $29,429 $19,500
History.Bachelor's $29,076 $24,423
International Relations and National Security Studies.Bachelor's $28,778 $21,666
Ethnic, Cultural Minority, Gender, and Group Studies.Bachelor's $28,412 $24,506
English Language and Literature, General.Bachelor's $28,107 $19,513
Anthropology.Bachelor's $28,090 $17,937
Natural Resources Conservation and Research.Bachelor's $27,557 $25,000
Sociology.Bachelor's $26,965 $18,376
Geography and Cartography.Bachelor's $26,943 $21,771
Linguistic, Comparative, and Related Language Studies and Services.Bachelor's $26,896 $23,499
East Asian Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics.Bachelor's $26,377 $25,000
Romance Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics.Bachelor's $25,916 $19,500
Drama/Theatre Arts and Stagecraft.Bachelor's $24,757 $29,399
Film/Video and Photographic Arts.Bachelor's $24,124 $23,250
Philosophy.Bachelor's $23,484 $18,822
Fine and Studio Arts.Bachelor's $22,381 $26,296
Music.Bachelor's $21,913 $27,000
Communication Disorders Sciences and Services.Bachelor's $21,507 $21,480

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
$15,457
≈ 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 (79 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