Pasadena City College Ranks 12th in State

Pasadena City College (Photo – pasadena.edu)

653 US community colleges were evaluated on three key dimensions: cost and financing, education outcomes and career outcomes.

By Scott Phelps

Using data collected as of July 2024 from the National Center for Education Statistics, the Campaign for Free College Tuition, the US Department of Education and the Council for Community & Economic Research, WalletHub researchers analyzed 653 US community colleges.

They used 18 metrics, with 8 in the cost and financing dimension, 7 in the education outcomes dimension, and 3 in the career outcomes dimension. These ranged “from the cost of in-state tuition and fees to the student-faculty ratio and graduation rate,” each with a 100-point scale. They then used a weighted average to come up with one score for each dimension for that college. Finally, each dimension was worth one-third of the college’s overall score.

Top scoring college and state

The highest-scoring college was Manhattan Area Technical College in Manhattan, Kansas which earned the top score of 70.63, “in large part because it puts students on track for good future earnings.”

The highest scoring state was Maryland, which had 5 of the top 45 scoring colleges.

California and Pasadena City College rankings

California’s score earned it a rank of 17th amongst the states in the nation. Pasadena City College’s overall score was 64.11, ranking it 53rd on the national list and 12th highest on the list of 77 California community colleges that were included in the study. Amongst all the schools in the study, Pasadena City College was ranked 116th in cost and financing, 145th in education outcomes and 245th in career outcomes.

Rankings of local community colleges in the State

• 12^th Pasadena City College
• 14^th LA Pierce College
• 19^th Cerritos College
• 27^th LA Mission College
• 30^th Chaffey College
• 33^rd Mt SAC College
• 34^th Glendale City College
• 38^th Citrus College
• 39^th LA Trade Tech
• 44^th LA Valley College
• 53^rd Los Angeles City College
• 60^th East LA College

Wide variation in costs

Interestingly, the college with the lowest in-state tuition and fees of all 653 colleges was not that far from Pasadena, San Bernardino Valley College. The college (in Illinois) with the highest in-state tuition and fees cost 18 times more!