A recent article in the Wall Street Journal ranked the top 20 public and private colleges according to their graduates' annual salary during their first 10 years in the field. UC Santa Barbara ranked 8th among public universities. Interestingly, nine of the top-ranked public colleges were from California. Cal Poly SLO, who share a collaborative NSF grant with UCSB on expanding data science within institutions of high education, rank 6th. With their well-established Data Science program, UC Berkeley ranks #1. According to the article, "Both the private- and public-school lists include many California schools, perhaps because last year one in six data-science jobs were based in the state."

Read the article to see the complete list of public and private schools, or to learn more about the anticipated salary of a recent data science graduate. The article also discusses the ranking methodology.