Colorado — Pikes Peak Community College
Average net price per year: $8,858
Median earnings six years after graduation: $31,300
Despite the fact that the typical student loan debt at Pikes Peak Community College is low at only $16,296 over four years, graduates seem to struggle to pay it off. The loan default rate is high: 13.7% according to the school. Its graduation rate is low: 23% according to the school. “This number has a lot to do with the high transience of our population,” says Karen Kovaly, a public relations coordinator at Pikes Peak. “With four military installations in the city, 26% of our students are military-affiliated and move on to another post prior to attaining a degree.” While most students speak fondly of the learning environment and their professors, others were more than ready to move on. “They can be as awful as they want, and people will still go here because it’s cheap and they have no other options,” writes one freshman. “The attitude I got from the higher-ups … is that they couldn’t care less about me, my grades, my life, my hopes for a degree, nothing.”