Associate degree · earnings 4 years after completing
Highest-Paying Colleges for Nursing (Associate)
Graduates who complete a associate degree in Nursing earn a median of $80,813 four years after finishing, and the middle half earn between $61,109 and $103,839. We rank the 512 U.S. colleges whose Nursing programs have at least 25 graduates in the Scorecard earnings sample, 50,662 graduates in all. That puts Nursing at #1 of 27 associate degree fields we rank, among the best-paid fields.
Contra Costa College, in California, leads at $160,743, 100% above the median ranked school ($80,343). Most schools are tightly bunched: the middle half of ranked schools earn between $74,992 and $89,686, and the lowest earns $36,980, so outside the leaders the choice of school moves earnings less than the choice of major. 247 of the 512 ranked schools (48%) match or beat the national median.
Public universities dominate the top 20: 16 public, 1 private nonprofit and 3 for-profit. Across all ranked schools, 86% are public. California places 18 schools in the top 20, ahead of New York (2).
The top 20 schools cost less than most: a median net price of $7,443 a year, against $8,854 across all 512 ranked schools. Their graduates who borrowed carry a median of $14,358 in federal loans, about 11% of one year of earnings. Measured against a typical high-school graduate in the same state, the median top-20 school recovers its net cost in about 0.2 years.
Showing the top 50 of 512 ranked schools. Select a column heading to re-sort the table. † = fewer than 40 graduates in the earnings sample.
| 1 | Contra Costa College San Pablo, CA Public · 2-year | $160,743 | 57 | — | $9,490 | 0.2 |
| 2 | College of Marin Kentfield, CA Public · 2-year | $147,805 | 44 | $14,000 | $12,351 | 0.2 |
| 3 | College of San Mateo San Mateo, CA Public · 2-year | $144,794 | 57 | $14,715 | $536 | <0.1 |
| 4 | Evergreen Valley College San Jose, CA Public · 2-year | $140,512 | 67 | $11,218 | $12,414 | 0.2 |
| 5 | San Joaquin Delta College Stockton, CA Public · 2-year | $140,130 | 43 | — | $2,407 | <0.1 |
| 6 | Los Medanos College Pittsburg, CA Public · 2-year | $131,467 | 34 † | — | $7,443 | 0.2 |
| 7 | Hartnell College Salinas, CA Public · 2-year | $131,440 | 34 † | — | $2,039 | <0.1 |
| 8 | Sierra College Rocklin, CA Public · 2-year | $128,780 | 28 † | — | $7,245 | 0.2 |
| 9 | Gavilan College Gilroy, CA Public · 2-year | $128,491 | 27 † | — | $6,542 | 0.1 |
| 10 | Modesto Junior College Modesto, CA Public · 4-year | $126,345 | 36 † | — | $2,818 | 0.1 |
| 11 | Sacramento City College Sacramento, CA Public · 2-year | $123,978 | 52 | $14,000 | $6,614 | 0.2 |
| 12 | CUNY Medgar Evers College Brooklyn, NY Public · 4-year | $122,671 | 30 † | $11,100 | $5,718 | 0.1 |
| 13 | American River College Sacramento, CA Public · 2-year | $122,386 | 40 | $12,750 | $7,999 | 0.2 |
| 14 | Pacific Union College Angwin, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | $122,041 | 95 | $25,104 | $41,008 | 1.0 |
| 15 | Solano Community College Fairfield, CA Public · 4-year | $121,175 | 50 | — | $4,669 | 0.1 |
| 16 | California Career College Canoga Park, CA For-profit · 4-year | $120,699 | 77 | $24,670 | $46,880 | 1.1 |
| 17 | Moorpark College Moorpark, CA Public · 4-year | $120,404 | 45 | — | — | — |
| 18 | Career Networks Institute Santa Ana, CA For-profit · 4-year | $120,211 | 157 | $27,986 | $49,677 | 1.2 |
| 19 | Mendocino College Ukiah, CA Public · 2-year | $118,469 | 31 † | — | $8,330 | 0.2 |
| 20 | St Paul's School of Nursing-Queens Rego Park, NY For-profit · 2-year | $118,259 | 188 | $26,125 | $26,315 | 0.6 |
| 21 | Nassau Community College Garden City, NY Public · 2-year | $116,858 | 117 | $15,313 | $7,095 | 0.2 |
| 22 | Swedish Institute a College of Health Sciences New York, NY For-profit · 2-year | $116,531 | 49 | $25,688 | $29,688 | 0.7 |
| 23 | Helene Fuld College of Nursing New York, NY Private nonprofit · 4-year | $116,303 | 183 | $15,250 | $47,181 | 1.2 |
| 24 | Yuba College Marysville, CA Public · 2-year | $116,142 | 58 | — | $2,576 | 0.1 |
| 25 | College of Staten Island CUNY Staten Island, NY Public · 4-year | $115,848 | 110 | $17,148 | $5,579 | 0.1 |
| 26 | Baltimore City Community College Baltimore, MD Public · 2-year | $115,663 | 43 | — | $15,987 | 0.4 |
| 27 | CUNY New York City College of Technology Brooklyn, NY Public · 4-year | $115,112 | 81 | $8,062 | $5,127 | 0.1 |
| 28 | Los Angeles City College Los Angeles, CA Public · 2-year | $115,035 | 27 † | — | $10,261 | 0.3 |
| 29 | Los Angeles Harbor College Wilmington, CA Public · 2-year | $114,575 | 65 | — | $13,250 | 0.3 |
| 30 | CUNY Queensborough Community College Bayside, NY Public · 2-year | $114,093 | 109 | $14,750 | $4,458 | 0.1 |
| 31 | Southwestern College (CA) Chula Vista, CA Public · 2-year | $113,302 | 59 | — | $12,671 | 0.3 |
| 32 | San Diego City College San Diego, CA Public · 4-year | $113,244 | 51 | — | $7,935 | 0.2 |
| 33 | Ventura College Ventura, CA Public · 2-year | $112,999 | 61 | $17,523 | — | — |
| 34 | Kapiolani Community College Honolulu, HI Public · 2-year | $112,628 | 71 | $11,525 | $5,202 | 0.1 |
| 35 | CUNY LaGuardia Community College Long Island City, NY Public · 2-year | $111,512 | 91 | $9,969 | $6,120 | 0.2 |
| 36 | College of the Siskiyous Weed, CA Public · 2-year | $110,965 | 35 † | $10,500 | $11,120 | 0.3 |
| 37 | Prince George's Community College Largo, MD Public · 2-year | $110,588 | 90 | $13,147 | $8,672 | 0.2 |
| 38 | Lemoore College Lemoore, CA Public · 2-year | $110,533 | 37 † | — | $10,832 | 0.3 |
| 39 | Mount Saint Mary's University Los Angeles, CA Private nonprofit · 4-year | $109,938 | 156 | $18,069 | $21,413 | 0.6 |
| 40 | Mt San Antonio College Walnut, CA Public · 2-year | $109,457 | 101 | $11,500 | $6,490 | 0.2 |
| 41 | Monroe University Bronx, NY For-profit · 4-year | $109,287 | 55 | $19,000 | $14,522 | 0.4 |
| 42 | University of Hawaii Maui College Kahului, HI Public · 4-year | $108,217 | 49 | $12,000 | $8,061 | 0.2 |
| 43 | CUNY Borough of Manhattan Community College New York, NY Public · 2-year | $107,534 | 127 | $12,480 | $4,976 | 0.1 |
| 44 | Glendale Career College Glendale, CA For-profit · 4-year | $107,406 | 80 | $29,211 | $49,195 | 1.4 |
| 45 | Pasadena City College Pasadena, CA Public · 2-year | $107,357 | 81 | — | $3,864 | 0.1 |
| 46 | Butte College Oroville, CA Public · 2-year | $107,202 | 133 | $12,000 | $5,520 | 0.2 |
| 47 | Stanbridge University Irvine, CA For-profit · 4-year | $106,807 | 68 | $35,329 | $45,372 | 1.3 |
| 48 | Shasta College Redding, CA Public · 4-year | $106,707 | 76 | $14,000 | $2,878 | 0.1 |
| 49 | Riverside City College Riverside, CA Public · 2-year | $106,618 | 196 | $10,000 | $8,377 | 0.2 |
| 50 | Chemeketa Community College Salem, OR Public · 4-year | $106,187 | 42 | $15,000 | $8,200 | 0.2 |
How this ranking is built
A school appears here only if it meets every condition below.
- Which programs count
- Main campuses only, one entry per institution. Scorecard reports program outcomes for the whole six-digit federal ID (OPEID6), so branch campuses share their parent’s numbers and are not listed twice.
- Only associate degree programs in Nursing (CIP 5138, the four-digit code Scorecard uses to group related programs).
- At least 25 graduates in the earnings sample. Smaller samples are left out because their medians swing too much and the counts carry a little privacy noise.
- A major gets a page only when at least 20 schools qualify. This one has 512.
- Ranked by median earnings 4 years after completing, highest first. Ties go to the larger sample, then to the school name.
- Schools missing earnings or a sample size are left out rather than estimated.
- What the numbers mean
- Earnings: median annual earnings of graduates four years after completing. The cohort completed in academic years 2017-18 and 2018-19 and was measured in calendar years 2022 and 2023, in 2024 dollars.
- Who is counted: graduates who received federal student aid (Title IV grants or loans), and only those who were working and not enrolled in more school that year. Graduates without federal aid, those who went on to further study and those with no earnings are not in the median.
- Scorecard adds privacy noise to counts and medians and hides values it cannot protect, so a gap of a few percent between two schools is not meaningful.
- Graduates: the number of graduates in that earnings sample. A † marks fewer than 40, where the figure is less precise.
- Debt: median federal loan debt (Stafford and Grad PLUS loans disbursed at that school) of graduates who borrowed, from the 2018-19 and 2019-20 completers. Parent PLUS and private loans are not included.
- Net price: average yearly cost after grants and scholarships for the whole institution, not this major, academic year 2023-24.
- Payback: 2 years of net price divided by how much these earnings exceed a high-school graduate’s in the school’s state. Shown only when that gap is at least $2,000, the same formula as the rest of the site.
- Source: U.S. Department of Education College Scorecard field-of-study data, June 2026 release.
Top states for Nursing earnings
Median of the school medians for states with at least 3 ranked schools. The best school in each state is shown.
| State | Median earnings | Ranked schools | Top school |
|---|---|---|---|
| California | $113,273 | 44 | Contra Costa College |
| Hawaii | $108,217 | 3 | Kapiolani Community College |
| Oregon | $97,861 | 9 | Chemeketa Community College |
| Connecticut | $94,738 | 3 | Connecticut State Community College |
| Nevada | $93,232 | 3 | Western Nevada College |
| New Jersey | $93,065 | 15 | Essex County College |
| New York | $90,390 | 42 | CUNY Medgar Evers College |
| Washington | $89,362 | 18 | Shoreline College |
| Maryland | $87,245 | 10 | Baltimore City Community College |
| Massachusetts | $86,396 | 16 | Roxbury Community College |
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Other fields to compare, by what graduates earn.
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