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Saint Mary’s College of California Data & Information Overview

419 awards Ranking Badges
Great Price Value for Your Money
70% Acceptance Rate
Get the facts about Saint Mary’s College of California. Learn how it ranks, what majors it offers, how diverse it is, and much more.
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How Well Is Saint Mary’s College of California Ranked?

#188 Best Colleges in Nation
#30 Best Colleges in CA
Liberal Arts General Studies Highest Ranked Major
Quality Badge

2024 Rankings

College Factual recognizes the best colleges and universities in its annual rankings. These rankings include categories for best overall colleges, best colleges for each major, best value schools, and much more.

Saint Mary's College of California was awarded 419 badges in the 2024 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is liberal arts general studies.

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Overall Quality

College Factual ranked SMC as #188 out of 2,217 colleges and universities in the country on its 2024 Best Colleges list. This puts it in the top 10% of all schools in the nation. This is an improvement over the previous year, when SMC held the #269 spot on the Best Overall Colleges list.

SMC also holds the #30 spot on the Best Colleges in California ranking.

See all of the rankings for Saint Mary's College of California.

Is It Hard to Get Into SMC?

70% Acceptance Rate
58% Of Accepted Are Women

Acceptance Rate

Saint Mary's College of California has an acceptance rate of 70%, which makes it somewhat selective. Make sure it's not the only school you apply to, even if it's your school of choice. Whether you get in or not will largely depend on how you compare to other applicants.

Learn more about Saint Mary’s College of California admissions.

Saint Mary’s College of California Faculty

9 to 1 Student to Faculty
24% Full Time Teachers

Student to Faculty Ratio

The student to faculty ratio is often used to measure the number of teaching resources that a college or university offers its students. The national average for this metric is 15 to 1, but at SMC it is much better at 9 to 1. That's good news for students who want to interact more on a personal level with their teachers.

Percent of Full-Time Faculty

In addition to the student to faculty ratio, some people look at what percentage of faculty members are full-time as a sign of how much time professors will be able to spend with their students. This is because part-time teachers may not be be on campus as much as their full-time counterparts.

The full-time faculty percentage at Saint Mary's College of California is 24%. This is lower than the national average of 47%.

Full-Time Faculty Percent  24 out of 100
0
100

Retention and Graduation Rates at Saint Mary’s College of California

88% Freshmen Retention
69% On-Time Graduation Rate

Freshmen Retention Rate

Saint Mary's College of California has a freshmen retention rate of 88%. 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  88 out of 100
0
100

Graduation Rate

Students are considered to have graduated on time if they finish their studies within four years. At SMC the on-time graduation rate of first-time, full-time students is 69%. That is great when compared to the national average of 33.3%

On-Time Graduation Rate  69 out of 100
0
100

Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at Saint Mary’s College of California.

Saint Mary’s College of California Undergraduate Student Diversity

2,308 Full-Time Undergraduates
56.6% Racial-Ethnic Minorities*
57.8% Percent Women

During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 2,468 undergraduates at SMC with 2,308 being full-time and 160 being part-time.

How Much Does Saint Mary’s College of California Cost?

$37,232 Net Price
78% Take Out Loans
$24,296 Total Student Loans
The overall average net price of SMC is $37,232. 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 SMC

$0-30 K $30K-48K $48-75 $75-110K $110K +
$28,783 $30,065 $28,773 $33,709 $44,250

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 SMC, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.

Student Loan Debt

Almost 66% of college students who graduated with the class of 2018 took out student loans, but that percentage varies from school to school. At SMC, approximately 78% of students took out student loans averaging $6,074 a year. That adds up to $24,296 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at SMC is 2.0%. 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 Saint Mary’s College of California.

How Much Money Do SMC Graduates Make?

$67,742 Avg Salary of Grads
High Earnings Boost
Although some majors pay more than others, students who graduate from SMC with a bachelor's degree go on to jobs where they make an average salary of $67,742 in their early years. That's great news for SMC students since it is 59% more than the average college graduate's salary of $42,485 per year.

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See which majors at Saint Mary’s College of California make the most money.

Location of Saint Mary’s College of California

California State
2,308 Full-Time Undergraduates
Suburb Campus Setting
Saint Mary's College of California is a private not-for-profit institution located in Moraga, California. The suburban atmosphere of Moraga makes it a great place for students who want the amenities of city life without actually living in the middle of a constant hustle and bustle.

Get more details about the location of Saint Mary’s College of California.

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Contact details for SMC are given below.

Contact Details
Address: 1928 Saint Marys Road, Moraga, CA 94575
Phone: 925-631-4000
Website: https://www.stmarys-ca.edu/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/stmarysca
Twitter: http://twitter.com/stmarysca

Saint Mary’s College of California Majors

61 Majors With Completions
711 Undergraduate Degrees
383 Graduate Degrees
During the most recent year for which we have data, students from 61 majors graduated from Saint Mary's College of California. Of these students, 711 received undergraduate degrees and 383 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
General Business/Commerce 163 $52,015
Liberal Arts General Studies 60 $41,425
Health & Physical Education 44 NA
General Psychology 44 $29,907
Communication & Media Studies 41 $36,184
General Biology 40 NA
Anthropology 27 NA
Political Science & Government 25 $33,089
Accounting 24 $64,833
Other Visual Art 22 NA

Learn more about the majors offered at Saint Mary's College of California along with which ones have the highest average starting salaries.

Online Learning at SMC

2% Take At Least One Class Online
1% Take All Classes Online

Online learning options are becoming more and more popular at American colleges and universities. Online classes are great for students who have busy schedules or for those who just want to study on their own time.

In 2020-2021, 53 students took at least one online class at Saint Mary's College of California. This is an increase from the 0 students who took online classes the previous year.

Year Took at Least One Online Class Took All Classes Online
2020-2021 53 34
2019-2020 0 0
2018-2019 0 0
2017-2018 0 0
2016-2017 0 0

Learn more about online learning at Saint Mary’s College of California.

If you’re considering Saint Mary’s College of California, here are some more schools you may be interested in knowing more about.

Curious on how these schools stack up against SMC? 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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