Colleges with the highest-paid grads

Harvard's campus is in Camridge, Mass., down the street from MIT.

Starting salary: $57,700
Mid-career salary: $118,200
% who think their job is meaningful: 66%

Harvard is the only Ivy League school to make the top 15 on Payscale's list and, like any other Ivy, it comes with a prestigious alumni network.

Among them: 47 Nobel Laureates (including Al Gore); Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush and 30 other heads of state; and 48 Pulitzer Prize winners.

With a strong and revered academic track record and a loyal alumni base, grads here often have few problems pursuing the career they want -- and getting paid handsomely for it.

First published March 5, 2015: 1:12 PM ET

Source: Source: PayScale.com. Data used in the College Salary Report came from surveys completed by roughly 1.4 million college graduates of 1,002 colleges and universities, which represent 75% of all bachelor's degree recipients in the U.S. Graduates with advanced degrees were excluded from the results. Only full-time, civilian workers based in the 50 states and District of Columbia were counted. The ranking is based on mid-career results, which comes from median salaries of graduates with 10 years of work experience. Whether a job is meaningful is based on the percentage of graduates who answered "Very much so" and "Yes" to the question: "Does your work make the world a better place?"

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