by our College Data Analytics TeamBelow is federal data on the loans students use to pay for Pacific University: median debt, the percentile spread, total borrowing including PLUS loans, and the cost to repay. All figures come from the U.S. Department of Education and IPEDS.
Looking at the entering class at Pacific, 92% of incoming students take out a loan to help cover first-year costs, averaging $8,288 per borrower, covering both private and federal loans.
The average federally funded loan is $5,397, which is 98.1% of the $5,500 first-year borrowing cap for the typical first-year dependent student. Be aware: the undergraduate-wide averages below exclude private loans, while this freshman number includes them.
For undergraduates overall at Pacific, 84% use federal student loans to help pay for their education, averaging $6,788 per year. That amounts to 25.8% higher than the freshman federal average of $5,397.
Carrying that yearly figure forward comes to roughly $13,576 across two years and $27,152 over a four-year span. This projection keeps yearly federal borrowing flat and excludes private and Parent PLUS loans.
| Undergraduate federal borrowing | Value |
|---|---|
| Share using federal loans | 84% |
| Average federal loan per year | $6,788 |
| Undergraduates with a federal loan | 1,299 |
| Total federal loans (one year) | $8,817,075 |
The middle borrower at Pacific owes $17,036 of cumulative federal debt.
| Borrower group | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| All federal borrowers | $17,036 |
| Students who completed (graduates) | $23,223 |
| Students who withdrew | $8,250 |
The figure for students who withdrew is worth watching: debt without a completed credential is the hardest to repay.
Looking only at the median is misleading — these four percentiles describe the full debt distribution for borrowers at Pacific.
| Percentile | Cumulative Federal Debt |
|---|---|
| 10th percentile (lowest-debt students) | $5,415 |
| 25th percentile | $9,025 |
| 75th percentile | $27,000 |
| 90th percentile (highest-debt students) | $34,500 |
The gap between the 10th and 90th percentile is the clearest single measure of how widely borrowing varies at Pacific.
PLUS loans — taken out by parents or graduate students — add to the total cost of attendance financed by debt at Pacific.
| Group | Borrowers | Median debt incl. PLUS |
|---|---|---|
| All borrowers | 534 | $29,994 |
| Completed (graduates) | 386 | $33,960 |
| Did not complete | 148 | $23,496 |
On a standard 10-year plan, the median completing borrower would pay about $403.82/mo.
Stafford loans are the federal direct-loan program most undergraduates use. The breakdown below separates borrowers who used Stafford loans from those who did not at Pacific.
Borrowers With a Stafford Loan This Year
| Cohort | Borrowers | Median debt incl. PLUS |
|---|---|---|
| Stafford loan this year | 506 | $29,859 |
| No Stafford loan this year | 28 | $30,244 |
The indicators below describe what the typical debt costs to pay back at Pacific.
Defaulting means failing to repay a federal student loan, which carries serious credit consequences. The federal two-year cohort default rate for Pacific appears below.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| 2-year cohort default rate | 1.3% |
| Borrowers in the cohort | 954 |
The cohort default rate tracks borrowers who entered repayment in a given year and defaulted within the two-year measurement window.
Median debt differs by income tier, first-generation status, and whether the student is financially dependent.
Median Debt by Income Bracket
| Income tier | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| Low income | $14,034 |
| Middle income | $17,750 |
| High income | $17,762 |
First-Gen vs Continuing-Gen Borrowing
| Cohort | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| First-generation students | $16,750 |
| Continuing-generation students | $17,566 |
Dependent vs Independent Borrowers
| Cohort | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| Dependent students | $19,000 |
| Independent students | $12,500 |
Federal data publishes the following gap measures for Pacific.
The Difference Between Subsidized and Unsubsidized Loans
With an unsubsidized loan, interest starts adding up the day the loan is disbursed, including during school. Subsidized loans, by contrast, do not accrue interest while you are enrolled at least half-time, which makes them the less expensive option when you qualify.
Important to Remember
Declaring bankruptcy does not erase federal student loan debt. If you stop paying, the federal government can garnish a portion of your wages until the loans are repaid.
References
More about our data sources and methodologies.