Best Value Colleges for Engineering Physics
Schools ranked by payback period — how quickly you recoup your investment through higher earnings.
6
Schools Ranked
$59,077
Avg. Earnings
1.2 yrs
Best Payback
200
Graduates
How we calculate value: Payback = (4 years of net price) / (major earnings - $35k baseline). A 2-year payback means you recoup your investment in 2 years through higher earnings vs. not attending college.
| # | School | Major Earnings | Payback |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Champaign, IL · Public | $74,845 | 1.2 yrs |
| 2 | University of Wisconsin-Platteville Platteville, WI · Public | $61,218 | 2.1 yrs |
| 3 | University of Colorado Boulder Boulder, CO · Public | $69,338 | 2.1 yrs |
| 4 | The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley Edinburg, TX · Public | $42,682 | 2.8 yrs |
| 5 | Murray State University Murray, KY · Public | $47,260 | 3.7 yrs |
| 6 | Colorado School of Mines Golden, CO · Public | $59,124 | 4.1 yrs |
Payback uses earnings by major from the College Scorecard's field-of-study file, last updated June 2026, against net price from the June 2026 release. Scorecard publishes the two separately, so they are different vintages.