College profile
Columbia College Chicago
IL · Private nonprofit · Large city · 7,873 applicants 2023
A parent's read
- The 4× payoff headline requires aid. Without aid this runs ~$51,889/yr. There's no income cutoff for need-based aid — whether you qualify depends on the gap between a school's price and your family's finances, so at a price like this even six-figure incomes often show need. Families who receive aid average ~$26,598/yr — against that, ten years of median earnings run ~4× the cost. Run the college's own net-price calculator before anchoring on the multiple.
- Ask the submit question deliberately. This college is test-optional — but at many such colleges, applicants who submit strong scores are admitted at meaningfully higher rates. “Optional” is a strategy decision, not a pass.
Composed from this page's data — every claim is backed by a number in the sections below.
Parent/student verdict
AccessibleAccessible for most applicants.
Best for
- Students focused on Visual & Performing Arts (the school's signature program)
Verdict is composed from this college's structured data (admit rate, SAT bands, net price with aid and at full price, Carnegie classification, scholarship grids) using transparent rule thresholds — not a chat-bot's opinion.
What are your child's odds here?
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Institutional snapshot
What kind of college is this?
Source: federal IPEDS Admissions 2023 for scores + admit rate; federal College Scorecard (20260606 vintage) for earnings + outcomes. SAT/ACT bands are the 25th–75th percentile of enrolled submitters.
Outcomes & cost
What graduates actually earn, finish, and owe.
Federal College Scorecard data. Earnings are median annual income measured years after entering. Debt is for federal-aid borrowers only (cash-pay students aren't counted).
The real cost
What Columbia College Chicago actually costs
Which side your family lands on isn't set by any national income line — it's set by Columbia College Chicago's own aid decision: the gap between its price and your family's finances.
Your odds + estimated cost across your whole college list, side by side.
The payoffTen years of typical graduate pay minus four years of cost — how many dollars ahead a typical graduate runs by year ten. Check both the full-price and with-aid versions to see which applies to you; median pay reflects who a college admits and what they study as much as the college itself., both ways
+$214K ahead at full price +$316K with aidSource: College Scorecard (average net price among Title IV first-time, full-time undergraduates who received aid) and each college's published cost of attendance. We don't show the federal net-price-by-income brackets: their categories were fixed in 2008 and never adjusted, and none of the averages is your family's own number — the full story. Payoff = (10-yr median earnings × 10) − (4 years of cost), in dollars — how far ahead a typical graduate runs by year ten; medians travel with the students a college admits and the majors they choose as much as with the college itself. Full price is the published cost of attendance; earnings are 10 years after enrollment, all majors combined.
What students study here
Most popular majors at Columbia College Chicago
Top 5 fields of study by bachelor's degrees awarded (most recent IPEDS Completions). Use this to see what Columbia College Chicago actually graduates — not just what it markets.
What those majors earn here
Median earnings 4 years after entry, by major — Columbia College Chicago's own graduates, not national averages.
| Major (CIP) | 4-yr earnings |
|---|---|
| Public Relations, Advertising, and Applied Communication. | $66,798 |
| Marketing. | $65,686 |
| Business Administration, Management and Operations. | $56,482 |
| Radio, Television, and Digital Communication. | $54,357 |
| Journalism. | $51,639 |
| Arts, Entertainment, and Media Management. | $50,592 |
| Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies, Other. | $49,593 |
| Design and Applied Arts. | $48,601 |
| American Sign Language. | $45,619 |
| Ethnic, Cultural Minority, Gender, and Group Studies. | $44,703 |
Sources: IPEDS Completions (C2023_a; bachelor's-level first majors, 2-digit CIP family — share is of the top 5 only) · College Scorecard program-level outcomes (PP-FOS). Full college-vs-major comparison: /college-outcomes →
Student body & economic mobility
Who attends here — and what the campus adds.
Opportunity Insights data. It measures two things at once: how many lower-income students a college enrols, and how many of them reach the top earnings quintile later. A high rate says the college does both — it does not establish that the campus caused the earnings, because the students it admits differ from the students it doesn't. Read it as a signal about access and destination, not as proof of value added.
Full leaderboards: /college-mobility →
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Feeder high schools
Which high schools send graduates to Columbia College Chicago?
Enrolled — from the schools' matriculation lists
13 high schools publish a numbered matriculation list — where their graduates actually enrolled, counted, in the school's own School Profile — and name Columbia College Chicago on it. Between them they printed 13 enrolled graduates. Ranked by graduates per class year enrolling at Columbia College Chicago, from each school's own published list: the number that school printed, divided by the class years its list covers. The published total and the school's own years label are shown beside every school, so a one-year list and a five-year list can sit on the same page. A list whose class years we cannot read is not divided by a guess — it is listed below with its total instead.
and 3 more
Admitted — from the schools' acceptance lists
4 high schools publish a numbered list of college acceptances — where their graduates were admitted, not where they enrolled — and name Columbia College Chicago on it. Between them they printed 5 admissions. Ranked by admissions per class year to Columbia College Chicago, from each school's own published acceptances list: the number that school printed, divided by the class years its list covers. Admits are counted at each college a student was admitted to, the same way the UC Reach Score counts a student admitted to three UC campuses three times — so this is a count of admissions, not of students. The published total and the school's own years label are shown beside every school, and a list whose class years we cannot read is listed below with its total rather than divided by a guess.
All 17 feeder schools, ranked →
Counted from each school's own published document, linked on that school's page. A high school that is not here does not publish a numbered list we could read — that is all absence means, and it says nothing about its graduates. Where a school publishes both, the two lists are shown separately: an acceptances list is not a list of enrollments, and the two are never added together.
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At a glance
JSON · Using this page with an AI assistantColumbia College Chicago is a private nonprofit four-year college in IL. It admitted 91% of applicants (7,873 applied, 2023). Test policy: Test-optional.
Cost: about $26,598 a year on average with aid, $51,889 a year at full price.
Median earnings ten years after entry: $42,195 a year. Payoff, meaning ten years of that pay minus four years of cost: $315,558 ahead with aid, $214,394 ahead at full price.
Highest median earnings four years after the degree, by program: Public Relations, Advertising, and Applied Communication ($66,798); Marketing ($65,686); Business Administration, Management and Operations ($56,482).
Economic mobility (Opportunity Insights): 10% of students came from families in the bottom fifth of income, and 9% of those reached the top fifth as adults.
High schools that publish a numbered matriculation list and name Columbia College Chicago: 13, 13 enrolled students between them — ranked by graduates per class year, most often Rowland Hall (1.0 per class year, 1 over 1 class year, Class of 2026); Rowland Hall-St. Mark's School (1.0 per class year, 1 over 1 class year, Class of 2026); Francis Parker School (0.2 per class year, 1 over 4 class years, 2022-2025). Each figure is the number that school printed divided by the class years its own list covers; the totals and years are shown. These are the schools that publish such a list, not every school that sends students; full list: https://highschoolreach.com/leaderboards/feeder-schools/columbia-college-chicago.
High schools that publish a numbered list of college acceptances naming Columbia College Chicago: 4, 5 admissions between them — ranked by admissions per class year, most often Archbishop Mitty High School (2.0 per class year, 2 over 1 class year, Class of 2025); Key School (0.2 per class year, 1 over 6 class years, 2021 - 2026, counted column "Acceptances 2021–2026"); St Anselm'S Abbey School (0.2 per class year, 1 over 5 class years, 2022-2026). Admits are counted at each college, so this counts admissions, not students. These are a different set of documents from the matriculation lists above and the two are never added together; full list: https://highschoolreach.com/leaderboards/feeder-schools/columbia-college-chicago.
Machine-readable version of this page: https://highschoolreach.com/colleges/columbia-college-chicago.json