Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Data & Information Overview

Want the scoop on Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute? We've put together a comprehensive report on the school that covers what majors RPI offers, how the school ranks, how diverse it is, and much more. 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.

• Rankings
• Admission and Acceptance
• Faculty
• Retention and Graduation Rates
• Diversity
• Cost
• Student Debt
• Average Earnings
• Location
• Majors
• Online Learning
• Related Schools

How Well Is Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Ranked?

2021 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.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute was awarded 81 badges in the 2021 rankings. The highest ranked major at the school is civil engineering.

Overall Quality

College Factual ranked RPI as #58 out of 1,715 colleges and universities in the country on its 2021 Best Colleges list. This lands it a coveted spot in the top 5% of all colleges and universities in the country.

RPI also holds the #8 spot on the Best Colleges in New York ranking.

See all of the rankings for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Is It Hard to Get Into RPI?

Acceptance Rate

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has an acceptance rate of 43%, which means the school is serious about who it admits. Take your time in putting together a strong application that highlights why you are a good fit for RPI.

Average Test Scores

About 66% of students accepted to RPI submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 640 and 730. Math scores were between 680 and 770.

RPI received ACT scores from 34% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT Composite scores ranged between 28 and 32.

Learn more about Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute admissions.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Faculty

Student to Faculty Ratio

The student to faculty ratio at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is about average at 13 to 1. This ratio is often used to gauge how many students might be in an average class and how much time professors will have to spend with their students on an individual level. The national average for this metric is 15 to 1.

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 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is 88%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.

Retention and Graduation Rates at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Freshmen Retention Rate

The freshmen retention rate of 93% tells us that most first-year, full-time students like Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute 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.

Graduation Rate

Students are considered to have graduated on time if they finish their studies within four years. At RPI the on-time graduation rate of first-time, full-time students is 63%. That is great when compared to the national average of 33.3%

Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Excellent Overall Diversity at RPI

During the 2017-2018 academic year, there were 6,628 undergraduates at RPI with 6,607 being full-time and 21 being part-time.

RPI Diversity Score

College Factual computes an overall diversity score for each college and university that takes gender, ethnicity, geographic location, and age into account. Schools with the best mixtures of students with respect to these factors are ranked the highest, and those that cater to just one or two student groups are ranked the lowest.

With an overall score of 90.81 out of 100, RPI is one of the most diverse schools in the nation.

Get more detailed information on diversity and student demographics at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

How Much Does Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Cost?

The overall average net price of RPI is $36,159. 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 RPI

$0-30 K	$30K-48K	$48-75	$75-110K	$110K +
$21,259	$20,731	$28,821	$33,990	$44,553

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 RPI, 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 RPI, approximately 53% of students took out student loans averaging $10,358 a year. That adds up to $41,432 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at RPI is 1.2%. 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 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

How Much Money Do RPI Graduates Make?

The pay for some majors is higher than others, but on average, students who graduate with a bachelor's degree from RPI make about $82,000 a year during their first few years of employment after graduation. This is good news for future RPI graduates since it is 106% more than the average college graduate's salary of $39,802 per year.

See which majors at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute make the most money.

Location of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is a private not-for-profit institution situated in Troy, New York. The surrounding area of the school is a good match for students who enjoy city life.

Get more details about the location of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Contact details for RPI are given below.

	Contact Details
Address:	110 8Th St, Troy, NY 12180-3590
Phone:	518-276-6000
Website:	www.rpi.edu
Facebook:	https://www.facebook.com/RPI.EDU
Twitter:	https://twitter.com/rpinews

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Majors

During the most recent year for which we have data, students from 60 majors graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Of these students, 1,359 received undergraduate degrees and 516 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
Computer Science	197	$91,900
Mechanical Engineering	191	$66,700
Chemical Engineering	115	$66,000
Biomedical Engineering	85	$66,500
Electrical Engineering	83	$74,000
Aerospace & Aeronautical Engineering	77	$69,000
Business Administration & Management	76	$57,700
Computer Engineering Technology	72	$88,400
General Architecture	58	$50,200
Civil Engineering	52	$66,000

Learn more about the majors offered at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute along with which ones have the highest average starting salaries.

Learn more about online learning at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Related Schools

If you’re considering Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, here are some more schools you may be interested in knowing more about.

• Case Western Reserve University
• Lehigh University
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Northeastern University
• University of Notre Dame

Curious on how these schools stack up against RPI? 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

• National Center for Education Statistics
• College Scorecard
• Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System
• Image Credit: By UpstateNYer under License

More about our data sources and methodologies.