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California Lutheran University Data & Information Overview

83 awards Ranking Badges
Great Price Value for Your Money
82% Acceptance Rate
Want the scoop on California Lutheran University? We’ve put together a comprehensive report on the school that covers what majors CLU offers, how the school ranks, how diverse it is, and much more.
Want to know more about a specific stat? Just click on its tile, and you’ll go to a page that goes more in-depth on that subject. You can also use the links below to go directly to any section on this page.

How Well Is California Lutheran University Ranked?

#412 Best Colleges in Nation
#71 Best Colleges in CA
Counselor Education/School Counseling & Guidance Services Highest Ranked Major

2024 Rankings

College Factual analyzes over 2,000 colleges and universities in its annual rankings and ranks them in a variety of ways, including most diverse, best overall quality, best for non-traditional students, and much more.

California Lutheran University was awarded 83 badges in the 2024 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is counselor education/school counseling & guidance services.

Explore Best Ranked Schools for You

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Overall Quality

CLU is ranked #412 out of 2,217 schools in the nation for overall quality on College Factual's 2024 Best Colleges list. This is an improvement over the previous year, when CLU held the #580 spot on the Best Overall Colleges list.

CLU is also ranked #71 out of 168 schools in California.

See all of the rankings for California Lutheran University.

Is It Hard to Get Into CLU?

82% Acceptance Rate
59% Of Accepted Are Women
17% Submit SAT Scores

Acceptance Rate

The acceptance rate at California Lutheran University is 82%. That's higher than the rate at many schools, but still low enough to be considered somewhat selective. If you want to get in, you'll need good grades and to be able to show that CLU is a good fit for you.

Average Test Scores

About 17% of students accepted to CLU submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 550 and 640. Math scores were between 540 and 650.

SAT Reading and Writing Scores for California Lutheran University  ( 550 to 640 )
200
800

SAT Math Scores for California Lutheran University  ( 540 to 650 )
200
800
CLU received ACT scores from 5% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT Composite scores ranged between 23 and 28.

ACT Composite Scores for California Lutheran University  ( 23 to 28 )
1
36

Learn more about California Lutheran University admissions.

California Lutheran University Faculty

14 to 1 Student to Faculty
100% Full Time Teachers

Student to Faculty Ratio

With a student to faculty ratio of 14 to 1, California Lutheran University is about average in this regard as the nationwide rate is 15 to 1. While this does not translate directly to class size, it's a good indicator of how much time professors will have to spend with their students on a one-on-one basis.

Percent of Full-Time Faculty

Another measure that is often used to estimate how much access students will have to their professors is how many faculty members are full-time. The idea here is that part-time faculty tend to spend less time on campus, so they may not be as available to students as full-timers.

The full-time faculty percentage at California Lutheran University is 100%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.

Full-Time Faculty Percent  100 out of 100
0
100

Retention and Graduation Rates at California Lutheran University

83% Freshmen Retention
61% On-Time Graduation Rate

Freshmen Retention Rate

California Lutheran University has a freshmen retention rate of 83%. That's a good sign that full-time students like the school and their professors enough to want to stick around for another year. It's also a sign that the admissions team did a good job in choosing applicants who were a good fit for the school.

Freshmen Retention Rate  83 out of 100
0
100

Graduation Rate

Students are considered to have graduated on time if they finish their studies within four years. At CLU the on-time graduation rate of first-time, full-time students is 61%. That is great when compared to the national average of 33.3%

On-Time Graduation Rate  61 out of 100
0
100

Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at California Lutheran University.

California Lutheran University Undergraduate Student Diversity

2,714 Full-Time Undergraduates
56.1% Racial-Ethnic Minorities*
56.7% Percent Women

During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 2,804 undergraduates at CLU with 2,714 being full-time and 90 being part-time.

How Much Does California Lutheran University Cost?

$27,410 Net Price
54% Take Out Loans
$30,096 Total Student Loans
The overall average net price of CLU is $27,410. The affordability of the school largely depends on your financial need since net price varies by income group. See the table below for the net price for different income groups.

Net Price by Income Group for CLU

$0-30 K $30K-48K $48-75 $75-110K $110K +
$20,774 $20,772 $24,375 $29,177 $37,476

The net price is calculated by adding tuition, room, board and other costs and subtracting financial aid.Note that the net price is typically less than the published for a school. For more information on the sticker price of CLU, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.

Student Loan Debt

It's not uncommon for college students to take out loans to pay for school. In fact, almost 66% of students nationwide depend at least partially on loans. At CLU, approximately 54% of students took out student loans averaging $7,524 a year. That adds up to $30,096 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at CLU is 2.7%. This is significantly lower than the national default rate of 10.1%, which is a good sign that you'll be able to pay back your student loans.

Get more details about paying for California Lutheran University.

How Much Money Do CLU Graduates Make?

$59,684 Avg Salary of Grads
High Earnings Boost
Although some majors pay more than others, students who graduate from CLU with a bachelor's degree go on to jobs where they make an average salary of $59,684 in their early years. That's great news for CLU students since it is 40% more than the average college graduate's salary of $42,485 per year.

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See which majors at California Lutheran University make the most money.

Location of California Lutheran University

California State
2,714 Full-Time Undergraduates
Midsize City Campus Setting
California Lutheran University is a private not-for-profit institution located in Thousand Oaks, California. The city atmosphere of Thousand Oaks makes it a great place for students who enjoy having lots of educational and entertainment options.

Get more details about the location of California Lutheran University.

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Contact details for CLU are given below.

Contact Details
Address: 60 W Olsen Rd, Thousand Oaks, CA 91360-2787
Phone: 805-492-2411
Website: www.callutheran.edu/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/callutheran
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CalLutheran

California Lutheran University Majors

45 Majors With Completions
869 Undergraduate Degrees
473 Graduate Degrees
During the most recent year for which we have data, students from 45 majors graduated from California Lutheran University. Of these students, 869 received undergraduate degrees and 473 graduated with a master's or doctor's degree. The following table lists the most popular undergraduate majors along with the average salary graduates from those majors make.

Most Popular Majors Bachelor’s Degrees Average Salary of Graduates
Business Administration & Management 132 $43,707
General Psychology 123 $28,005
Communication & Media Studies 62 $31,193
General Biology 56 $26,541
Health & Physical Education 54 $20,692
Criminology 53 NA
Accounting 47 $62,706
Management Sciences & Quantitative Methods 31 $69,402
Political Science & Government 31 NA
Liberal Arts General Studies 30 $21,814

Learn more about the majors offered at California Lutheran University along with which ones have the highest average starting salaries.

Online Learning at CLU

15% Take At Least One Class Online
5% Take All Classes Online

Online learning is becoming popular at even the oldest colleges and universities in the United States. Not only are online classes great for returning adults with busy schedules, they are also frequented by a growing number of traditional students.

In 2020-2021, 558 students took at least one online class at California Lutheran University. This is a decrease from the 4,023 students who took online classes the previous year.

Year Took at Least One Online Class Took All Classes Online
2020-2021 558 181
2019-2020 4,023 3,730
2018-2019 369 99
2017-2018 463 129
2016-2017 456 158

Learn more about online learning at California Lutheran University.

If you’re considering California Lutheran University, here are some more schools you may be interested in knowing more about.

Curious on how these schools stack up against CLU? Pit them head to head with College Combat, our free interactive tool that lets you compare college on the features that matter most to you!

Notes and References

Footnotes

*The racial-ethnic minorities count is calculated by taking the total number of students and subtracting white students, international students, and students whose race/ethnicity was unknown. This number is then divided by the total number of students at the school to obtain the racial-ethnic minorities percentage.

References

More about our data sources and methodologies.

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