Admissions & acceptance rate
First-time freshman admissions: how selective the college is, and how many admitted students choose to enroll.
Graduation rate & outcomes
Completion, retention, and the equity gap between Pell and non-Pell students.
Pell equity
Non-Pell students graduate at a 5.0-point higher rate than Pell recipients.
Program outcomes
Federal Program Performance Data: how each program's graduate earnings and debt measure up under Financial Value Transparency and Gainful Employment.
Of 512 Title IV programs, 149 pass the federal Gainful Employment test and 0 fail. 363 have graduate earnings too small to publish, so they carry no pass/fail verdict.
Pass / fail distribution
- Passing149 · 29.1%
- No Data363 · 70.9%
- Failing0 · 0.0%
Severity spectrum
Tiers band programs by how far graduate earnings sit above or below the benchmark, from Critical (below −15%) through Safe (above +25%). No data means earnings were privacy-suppressed.
Earnings premium gap
Graduate earnings versus the federal benchmark, worst gaps first.
Debt vs earnings
Median completer debt against median graduate earnings, highest burden first.
Accreditation status & history
Who accredits the institution, current standing, and any past actions.
Middle States Commission on Higher Education
Programmatic accreditations · 24
Action history · 23
- Jul 2025Renewal of AccreditationAmerican Speech-Language-Hearing Association, Council on Academic Accreditation in Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology · Speech-Language Pathology (SLP) - Graduate degree programs
- Aug 2024Renewal of AccreditationCommission on English Language Program Accreditation · English Language
- Jul 2024Renewal of AccreditationAmerican Psychological Association, Commission on Accreditation · Clinical Psychology (CLPSY) - PhD Doctoral programs
- Jul 2024Renewal of AccreditationAcademy of Nutrition and Dietetics, Accreditation Council for Education in Nutrition and Dietetics · Dietetics (DIET) - Coordinated Program in Dietetics
- Jun 2024Renewal of AccreditationMiddle States Commission on Higher Education
Tuition & cost
What families actually pay, broken down by family income.
Net price by family income
Negative values mean aid exceeds the published cost of attendance for that income band.
Federal aid volume & trends
Pell grants and federal Direct Loan volume disbursed to students, and how they've trended.
In AY 2024–25, 20,302 students received $116.5M in Pell grants, alongside $466.8M in federal Direct Loans.
Pell recipients · 5-year trend
Loan volume by type · AY 2024–25
Loan awards count each loan type a student holds, not unique borrowers; one student may carry several (e.g. subsidized and unsubsidized), so the per-type figures are the reliable detail.
Student loan default rate
The share of student borrowers who default on federal loans within three years, against the national benchmark.
Of 17,838 borrowers who entered repayment, 254 (1.4%) defaulted within three years — below the 2.3% national rate.
Default rate vs national, by cohort
* Cohorts 2020 and later read near 0% because the federal COVID-19 payment pause (CARES Act) suspended defaults nationwide. These years reflect a national policy, not institutional performance; the 2019 cohort is the last measured under normal repayment.
Academic programs at PSU
Top program areas ranked by completions.
Top program families by completions
Enrollment trends & demographics
Fall headcount, 12-month unduplicated enrollment, and student body composition.
Gender split
Race / ethnicity composition
Athletics & Title IX gender equity
How athletic participation, aid, and spending are split between men and women.
Men vs women · spending splits
Sport-by-sport · 16
Campus safety & crime statistics
Reported on-campus crimes over the last three years, including violence and hate crimes.
Criminal offenses by type
By location
- On campus117
- Non-campus48
- Public property1
Includes 75 in residence halls (a subset of on-campus, not added to the total).
VAWA offenses
Hate crimes by bias
- Ethnicity2
- Religion1
Arrests vs disciplinary referrals
Residence-hall fires
- Stuart Hall1 fireCookingDamage $0-$99
- Ray Hall1 fireCookingDamage $100-$999
- Holderman Hall1 fireCookingDamage $0-$99
- Nittany 541 fireOpen flamesDamage $0-$99
Data quality: 12 reports were later determined unfounded across the reporting period and are excluded from the totals above.
Student-faculty ratio
Student-to-faculty ratio and instructional staff counts.
PSU vs Peer comparison
The peer institutions PSU selected for federal comparison reporting.
A larger shape on any axis means this institution outperforms its peers on that dimension. For acceptance rate and net price, lower raw values are inverted so "more selective" and "more affordable" appear larger.
| Carnegie | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
SubjectPennsylvania State University-Main Campus | 86% | — | 50,737 | $32,598 | R1 Research |
University of Pittsburgh-Pittsburgh Campus | 85% | 58.1% | 35,724 | $30,074 | R1 Research |
Temple University | 75% | 80.4% | 29,640 | $29,219 | R1 Research |
Rutgers University-New Brunswick | 84% | 58.1% | 52,269 | $23,519 | R1 Research |
University of Maryland-College Park | 89% | 44.8% | 41,725 | $15,590 | R1 Research |
University at Buffalo | 75% | 74.2% | 31,903 | $20,470 | R1 Research |
| Peer group median | 85% | 58.1% | 38,725 | $26,369 |
Frequently asked questions about Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus
Quick answers to the questions most often asked about PSU.
What is the graduation rate at Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus?
How many students attend Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus?
What is the average net price at Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus?
What is the yield rate at Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus?
Where is Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus located?
Have a question this page can’t answer?
Ask Clema anything about Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus and its peers — plain language in, cited answers out, in minutes instead of days.
Free for teams up to 3 · No credit card