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Grand Valley State University Data & Information Overview

433 awards Ranking Badges
Great Price Value for Your Money
92% Acceptance Rate
If you want to know more about Grand Valley State University, such as what majors does it offer, how diverse it is, how well it ranks, and more, this is your one-stop resource.
Want to dig deeper into a particular stat? Just click on its tile and you’ll be taked to a more in-depth page on the figure. In addition, you can use the links below to quickly jump to any section on this page.

How Well Is Grand Valley State University Ranked?

#399 Best Colleges in Nation
#9 Best Colleges in MI
Accounting Highest Ranked Major

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.

Grand Valley State University was awarded 433 badges in the 2024 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is accounting.

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Overall Quality

College Factual ranked GVSU as #399 out of 2,217 colleges and universities in the country on its 2024 Best Colleges list.

GVSU is also ranked #9 out of 57 schools in Michigan.

See all of the rankings for Grand Valley State University.

Is It Hard to Get Into GVSU?

92% Acceptance Rate
67% Of Accepted Are Women

Acceptance Rate

Because it has a high acceptance rate of 92%, some consider GVSU to be a safety school. But don't just assume that admittance is in the bag. Make sure to spend enough time on your application so that it is in tip-top shape.

Learn more about Grand Valley State University admissions.

Grand Valley State University Faculty

15 to 1 Student to Faculty
73% Full Time Teachers

Student to Faculty Ratio

The student to faculty ratio is often used to estimate how much interaction there is between professors and their students at a college or university. At Grand Valley State University, this ratio is 15 to 1, which is on par with the national average of 15 to 1. That's not bad at all.

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 Grand Valley State University is 73%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.

Full-Time Faculty Percent  73 out of 100
0
100

Retention and Graduation Rates at Grand Valley State University

83% Freshmen Retention
38% On-Time Graduation Rate

Freshmen Retention Rate

The freshmen retention rate of 83% tells us that most first-year, full-time students like Grand Valley State University enough to come back for another year. This is a fair bit higher than the national average of 68%. That's certainly something to check off in the good column about the school.

Freshmen Retention Rate  83 out of 100
0
100

Graduation Rate

The on-time graduation rate is the percent of first-time, full-time students who get their bachelor's degree with four years. At GVSU this rate is 38%, which is about average when compared to the national rate of 33.3%.

On-Time Graduation Rate  38 out of 100
0
100

Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at Grand Valley State University.

Grand Valley State University Undergraduate Student Diversity

18,013 Full-Time Undergraduates
16.3% Racial-Ethnic Minorities*
61.2% Percent Women

During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 20,405 undergraduates at GVSU with 18,013 being full-time and 2,392 being part-time.

How Much Does Grand Valley State University Cost?

$17,356 Net Price
51% Take Out Loans
$26,452 Total Student Loans
The overall average net price of GVSU is $17,356. 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 GVSU

$0-30 K $30K-48K $48-75 $75-110K $110K +
$10,259 $11,026 $15,277 $19,603 $21,248

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 GVSU, 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 GVSU, approximately 51% of students took out student loans averaging $6,613 a year. That adds up to $26,452 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at GVSU 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 Grand Valley State University.

How Much Money Do GVSU Graduates Make?

$50,273 Avg Salary of Grads
High Earnings Boost
Although some majors pay more than others, students who graduate from GVSU with a bachelor's degree go on to jobs where they make an average salary of $50,273 in their early years. This is good news for future GVSU graduates since it is 18% more than the average college graduate's salary of $42,485 per year.

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See which majors at Grand Valley State University make the most money.

Location of Grand Valley State University

Michigan State
18,013 Full-Time Undergraduates
Suburb Campus Setting
Located in Allendale, Michigan, Grand Valley State University is a public institution. GVSU is located in a safe and convenient suburb.

Get more details about the location of Grand Valley State University.

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Contact details for GVSU are given below.

Contact Details
Address: 1 Campus Dr, Allendale, MI 49401-9403
Phone: 616-331-2020
Website: www.gvsu.edu/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/grandvalley
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/gvsu

Grand Valley State University Majors

87 Majors With Completions
5,212 Undergraduate Degrees
912 Graduate Degrees
During the most recent year for which we have data, students from 87 majors graduated from Grand Valley State University. Of these students, 5,212 received undergraduate degrees and 912 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 Biology 353 $31,914
Marketing 302 $43,752
Health & Physical Education 286 $27,617
Finance & Financial Management 280 $47,558
General Psychology 254 $28,122
Other Health Professions 253 $30,278
Nursing 208 $59,822
Public Relations & Advertising 208 $37,125
General Education 196 $38,643
Accounting 178 $46,872

Learn more about the majors offered at Grand Valley State University along with which ones have the highest average starting salaries.

Online Learning at GVSU

46% Take At Least One Class Online
5% 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, 10,213 students took at least one online class at Grand Valley State University. This is a decrease from the 21,395 students who took online classes the previous year.

Year Took at Least One Online Class Took All Classes Online
2020-2021 10,213 1,187
2019-2020 21,395 3,726
2018-2019 2,974 331
2017-2018 2,406 291
2016-2017 1,786 347

Learn more about online learning at Grand Valley State University.

If you’re considering Grand Valley State University, here are some more schools you may be interested in knowing more about.

Curious on how these schools stack up against GVSU? 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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