Linguistic, Comparative, at Northern Arizona University

Northern Arizona University's linguistics program delivers something unusual: graduates earning $38,177 their first year—a figure that crushes the national median of $27,449 by nearly 40%. This places the program in the 95th percentile nationally among linguistics programs, meaning only one in twenty comparable programs produces better early earnings. The debt load of $20,500 is essentially average for the field, creating a notably favorable 0.54 debt-to-earnings ratio that suggests graduates can manage their loans on entry-level salaries.

The state comparison is harder to interpret since Arizona has only two linguistics programs, both showing identical earnings figures. However, the national standing tells the more important story here. For a program at a school with a 91% admission rate, these outcomes are genuinely impressive. Most linguistics graduates face challenging job markets with modest starting salaries, but NAU students are clearly finding better opportunities—whether through stronger career services, regional employer connections, or program-specific skills that translate to higher-paying roles.

The moderate sample size (30-100 graduates) suggests stable data without being so small that one or two outliers could skew results. For families considering a humanities degree with reasonable financial risk, this program offers a compelling case: better earnings than most peers while keeping debt manageable.