RPI Industrial Engineering (Bachelor's): Tuition, Graduate Salary, and Debt
- Bachelor's in Industrial Engineering
- Private nonprofit school
- Troy, NY
- About 29 graduates a year
College Scorecard June 2026 release · BLS wages May 2025
The short answer
RPI industrial engineering graduates earn about what industrial engineering graduates earn nationally, $74,787 in their first year. The typical graduate leaves with $22,750 in federal loans, close to the national median of $24,750. One other New York program reports higher pay.
How it compares
Each figure is the median for graduates of the program. The New York and national columns are the medians across all industrial engineering bachelor's programs that report the figure.
Five years out, RPI graduates earn more than the national figure and about $11,831 more than the New York median.
Debt and first-year pay at every New York industrial engineering program
Programs in the upper left give graduates higher pay for less debt. Dashed lines mark the New York medians.
Hover over or tap a dot to see the school. Only programs that report both earnings and debt are shown.
What graduates earn over time
Pay rises about 57% between the first and fifth year.
Year 1 and year 5 figures come from different graduating classes, so the growth rate is an estimate.
Paying back the loans
On a standard 10-year plan, the median debt means a payment of about $241 a month, or 3.9% 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
Prices in the Albany area are about the same as the national average.
Careers this field leads to
These are the jobs that the federal crosswalk from fields of study to occupations links to industrial engineering, largest first. Pay is the median across all experience levels.
Industrial Engineers
$102,640Median pay in New York. 11,810 people work in this job in New York. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 12% from 2025 to 2035, with about 23,100 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree.
Industrial Production Managers
$130,470Median pay in New York. 6,630 people work in this job in New York. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 3% from 2025 to 2035, with about 17,000 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree, plus 5 years or more of related work experience.
Architectural and Engineering Managers
$175,710Median pay in New York. 8,250 people work in this job in New York. Nationally, jobs are projected to grow 6% from 2025 to 2035, with about 14,900 openings a year. Typical education to start: bachelor's degree, plus 5 years or more of related work experience.
About RPI
Industrial Engineering ranks 8th of 17 bachelor's programs at RPI by first-year earnings. The top three are Computer Science ($104,943), Computer Engineering Technology ($94,722), and Computer and Information Science ($85,172).
Common questions
The median graduate earns $74,787 one year after graduating and $117,724 five years after. The median across industrial engineering bachelor's programs in New York is $72,764.
The median federal loan balance is $22,750, which ranks 2nd lowest of 5 industrial engineering bachelor's programs in New York. That works out to about $241 a month over 10 years.
On the numbers, yes for most students. Debt equals 30% of first-year earnings, against a national median of 33%, and the share of borrowers in default two years into repayment is 20% or less.
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 New York 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 industrial engineering 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