What Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology Graduates Earn

Median earnings at 1, 4, and 5 years (College Scorecard)

Start with the shape of the table: Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology pays $45,356 at the first measured horizon and $66,076 at the last, and those two medians rest on 278 and 412 graduates counted respectively. The headline figures weight each reporting program by its graduates counted, so the 400-graduate program moves the national number more than the 12-graduate one; the unweighted column beside it shows the middle program, plain and simple.

The trajectory is the story here: $45,356 at year one, $63,104 at year four, $66,076 at year five. That is 46% growth across the window Scorecard measures, worth $20,720 a year by the fifth year. Fields with flat early curves repay debt slowly; this one's curve works in the borrower’s favor.

By Pell status, the year-one medians for Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology are $48,132 (received Pell) and $42,731 (did not), $5,401 apart. The split is a reminder that a field median averages over very different starting points; the institution a student picks inside the field moves their personal figure more than the field label does.

Inside its own CIP family, Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology ranks 3 of 4 published bachelor's fields by five-year earnings; the family median at that horizon is $66,076. Its closest sibling is Geological and Earth Sciences/Geosciences at $64,859, below this field's $66,076. Family comparisons strip out the broad field effect and leave the specific program choice exposed.

Ranked across all 182 published fields, Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology stands number 90 by five-year earnings and number 89 by first-year earnings, and number 155 from the lowest median debt. Those three ranks together are the field's fingerprint: high earn rank with a low debt rank is the combination students are actually shopping for, and this field's spread between them is 65 places.

The debt side of the same degree

Debt first, because earnings get the headlines: $24,000 is the median federal loan balance at graduation in Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, pooled from 10 reporting programs. Against year-one earnings of $45,356 that balance is 53% of a year's gross pay, roughly 6.3 months of it. The standard 10-year repayment at 6.52% (the 2026-27 undergraduate Direct Loan rate) runs $273 a month and $8,731 in total interest. Your own balance and rate belong in the student loan payoff calculator; the degree-level verdict belongs in the college ROI calculator and the college major ROI calculator.

Where graduates of this field earn the most

Where a student studies inside this field matters at least as much as the field itself. These five programs post the strongest five-year medians in Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology among programs with at least 30 graduates in the count, led by University of Oklahoma-Norman Campus at $72,596, against a national field median of $66,076.

A median is a middle graduate, not a promise: half of University of Oklahoma-Norman Campus's counted graduates earn less than $72,596. Weigh any program here against its own price using the net price estimator and the degree cost calculator.

Two more facts about the shape of this field: the five highest-paying programs in the table account for only 34.7% of the 412 graduates counted at five years, so the top of the table is a thin slice and not the field's center; and the leading program's five-year median of $72,596 sits 10% above the national field median of $66,076. Its median debt, $27,000, runs above the field median of $24,000, which is the trade a student at the top of this table is actually being offered.