Cognitive Science at University of Minnesota-Duluth

Looking at comparable cognitive science programs nationwide, this degree appears financially sound, with estimated first-year earnings of $41,362 and debt around $17,481—a manageable 0.42 ratio that means roughly five months of income to cover what's borrowed. The debt figure is actually slightly below the national median for these programs, which matters when you're looking at a relatively accessible state university with an 82% admission rate.

The challenge is that cognitive science occupies an unusual academic space—it's interdisciplinary by design, blending psychology, computer science, and neuroscience—and career trajectories vary wildly depending on which direction graduates take. Programs like this typically prepare students for everything from UX research to data analysis to graduate school in psychology or AI. That $41,000 starting salary represents students heading in very different directions, and it's worth knowing that the national 75th percentile reaches $50,710, suggesting significant upside for those who leverage the computational or research-focused aspects of the degree.

Given UMN-Duluth's smaller scale and the suppressed data, your child would benefit from investigating how this specific program structures its curriculum—whether it leans technical (valuable) or theoretical (grad school pipeline). The debt burden won't be crushing either way, but the career payoff hinges entirely on building marketable skills alongside the degree, particularly in programming, statistics, or lab research that translates beyond academia.