Benedictine University Nursing (BSN): Tuition, Graduate Salary, and Debt
- Bachelor's in Registered Nursing, Nursing Administration, Nursing Research and Clinical Nursing
- Private nonprofit university
- Lisle, IL
- About 65 graduates a year
College Scorecard June 2026 release · BLS wages May 2025
The short answer
Benedictine University nursing graduates earn about what nursing graduates earn nationally, $80,136 in their first year. Where this program stands out is debt. The typical graduate leaves with $17,188 in federal loans, less than at 94% of nursing programs in the country. It is one of the higher-paying nursing degrees in Illinois.
How it compares
Each figure is the median for graduates of the program. The Illinois and national columns are the medians across all nursing bachelor's programs that report the figure.
Five years out, Benedictine University graduates earn about the national figure and about the same as the Illinois median.
Debt and first-year pay at every Illinois nursing program
Programs in the upper left give graduates higher pay for less debt. Dashed lines mark the Illinois medians.
Hover over or tap a dot to see the school. Only programs that report both earnings and debt are shown.
Some nursing bachelor's programs are for nurses who are already licensed and working (RN-to-BSN). College Scorecard counts them with programs for new students, and their graduates' pay reflects years of nursing experience, so high pay at a program here may not mean higher starting pay for a new nurse.
What graduates earn over time
Pay rises about 1% between the first and fifth year. Registered nurses in Illinois earn a median of $95,990 across all experience levels, which shows how much room there is to grow after the first few years.
Year 1 and year 5 figures come from different graduating classes, so the growth rate is an estimate. BLS figures cover registered nurses at every experience level.
Does family income change the outcome?
Graduates who received Pell Grants, which go to students from lower-income families, earned about the same in their first year as other graduates. They also borrowed less. At this program, the outcome does not look worse for students with less money.
Paying back the loans
On a standard 10-year plan, the median debt means a payment of about $182 a month, or 2.7% of a graduate's typical monthly pay in the first year.
The government publishes these as ranges to protect privacy. They were measured in 2018 to 2020, partly during the pandemic pause on federal loan payments, so the forbearance share may be higher than usual.
Where graduates work, and what the pay is worth
95% of graduates (112 of 118) were working in Illinois one year after graduating. Prices in the Chicago area are about 4% above the national average, so a $80,136 salary here buys what about $77,355 buys in a typical US city.
The median Illinois RN earns $95,990, compared with a national median of $97,550. After adjusting for Illinois prices, that pay is worth about $96,030, which puts Illinois slightly behind.
Careers this field leads to
These are the jobs that the federal crosswalk from fields of study to occupations links to nursing, largest first. Pay is the median across all experience levels.
Registered Nurses
$95,990Median pay in Illinois. 138,910 people work in this job in Illinois. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 6% from 2025 to 2035, with about 180,800 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree.
Medical and Health Services Managers
$117,850Median pay in Illinois. 22,460 people work in this job in Illinois. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 24% from 2025 to 2035, with about 62,300 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree, plus less than 5 years of related work experience.
Nurse Practitioners
$130,680Median pay in Illinois. 9,270 people work in this job in Illinois. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 41% from 2025 to 2035, with about 29,400 openings a year. Typical education to start: master's degree.
Nurse Anesthetists
$286,830Median pay in Illinois. 1,140 people work in this job in Illinois. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 10% from 2025 to 2035, with about 2,400 openings a year. Typical education to start: master's degree.
About Benedictine University
Nursing ranks 2nd of 18 bachelor's programs at Benedictine University by first-year earnings. The top three are Human Resources ($83,475), Nursing ($80,136), and Computer Science ($62,235).
Other nursing bachelor's programs near Lisle
Common questions
The median graduate earns $80,136 one year after graduating and $80,958 five years after. Registered nurses in the Chicago metro area earn a median of $100,490 across all experience levels.
The median federal loan balance is $17,188, which ranks the lowest of 32 nursing bachelor's programs in Illinois. That works out to about $182 a month over 10 years.
On the numbers, yes for most students. Debt equals 21% of first-year earnings, against a national median of 36%, and the share of borrowers in default two years into repayment is 10% or less.
Most do. 95% (112 of 118) were working in Illinois one year after graduating.
About this data
- Earnings and debt only include students who received federal financial aid (grants or loans).
- Earnings only count graduates who were working and not enrolled in more school. Graduates who went straight to further study are not included.
- Debt only includes federal loans. Private loans and credit cards are not counted.
- Some schools with several campuses report one combined figure for all of them. We count each of those schools once, and leave them out of Illinois comparisons when their main campus is in another state.
- Scorecard figures describe graduating classes from several years ago. BLS wages are from May 2025.
- School-level numbers like tuition, admission rate, and graduation rate are for the whole school, not the nursing program.
Sources
- U.S. Department of Education, College Scorecard, field of study and institution files, June 2026 release
- Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025
- Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections 2025 to 2035
- Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Price Parities, 2024
- NCES, CIP 2020 to SOC 2018 crosswalk, and IPEDS institution directory, 2024