What Theological and Ministerial Studies Graduates Earn

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

The three rows below are the whole earnings story Scorecard can tell about Theological and Ministerial Studies: $37,894, then $46,072, then $48,871. Each median is graduate-weighted, built from 21 programs at year one and 32 at year five, and the unweighted program median sits alongside so a reader can see how much the weighting itself is doing.

From $37,894 in the first year to $48,871 in the fifth, earnings grow 29% ($10,977). For scale, the median bachelor's field in the Scorecard file grows from $45,010 to $65,763 over the same span, so this field's early-career slope is gentler than typical.

By Pell status, the year-one medians for Theological and Ministerial Studies are $37,182 (received Pell) and $38,722 (did not), $1,540 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, Theological and Ministerial Studies ranks 1 of 3 published bachelor's fields by five-year earnings; the family median at that horizon is $47,064. Its closest sibling is Bible/Biblical Studies at $47,064, below this field's $48,871. Family comparisons strip out the broad field effect and leave the specific program choice exposed.

Ranked across all 182 published fields, Theological and Ministerial Studies stands number 166 by five-year earnings and number 153 by first-year earnings, and number 121 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 45 places.

The debt side of the same degree

Across the 21 programs that report debt for Theological and Ministerial Studies, the median graduate owes $21,843. Set beside the $37,894 year-one median, the debt is 58% of first-year gross earnings, about 6.9 months of pay before tax. Repaid on the standard 10-year schedule at 6.52%, it costs $248 monthly and $7,946 in interest. The student loan payoff calculator replays that schedule with your numbers, and the college ROI calculator weighs the full cost against the earnings table above.

Where graduates of this field earn the most

Program medians scatter widely around the national $48,871 five-year figure. The table ranks the reporting programs by their five-year median, keeping only programs with at least 30 graduates in that count so a tiny cohort cannot top the list by luck. Martin Luther College leads it at $64,016.

A program median describes that program's own graduates in that program's own labor market; Martin Luther College at $64,016 is evidence about a place and a mix of students, not a wage offer. Put the same programs' prices next to these figures with the degree cost calculator and the net price estimator before ranking anything.

Two more facts about the shape of this field: the five highest-paying programs in the table account for only 24.6% of the 1,030 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 $64,016 sits 31% above the national field median of $48,871. Its median debt, $18,375, runs below the field median of $21,843, which is the trade a student at the top of this table is actually being offered.