by our College Data Analytics TeamThis overview covers the essential stats on Southern Adventist University, including its rankings, majors, diversity, and more.
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.
Southern Adventist University was awarded 86 badges in the 2026 rankings.
Southern Adventist is ranked #1,484 out of 3,449 schools in the nation for overall quality on College Factual’s 2026 Best Colleges list. This puts it in the top 20% of all schools in the nation.
Southern Adventist is also ranked #25 on the Best Colleges in Tennessee list.
The acceptance rate at Southern Adventist University is a competitive 66%, so make sure you take your application seriously when putting it together. Even leaving out a minor detail could be a reason to move you to the rejection pile.
About 46% of students accepted to Southern Adventist submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 530 and 660. Math scores were between 490 and 640.
Southern Adventist received ACT scores from 60% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT Composite scores ranged between 19 and 25.
The student to faculty ratio at Southern Adventist University is 19 to 1, which is high when compared to the national average of 15 to 1. This may indicate that some of your classes will be larger in size than they would be at other schools. However, upper level classes will probably be smaller.
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 on campus as much as their full-time counterparts.
The full-time faculty percentage at Southern Adventist University is 99%. This is higher than the national average of 47%.
The freshmen retention rate of 82% tells us that most first-year, full-time students like Southern Adventist 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.
Students are considered to have graduated on time if they finish their studies within four years. At Southern Adventist the on-time graduation rate of first-time, full-time students is 51%. That is great when compared to the national average of 33.3%.
Find out more about the retention and graduation rates at Southern Adventist University.
The current enrollment includes 2,673 undergraduates at Southern Adventist.
Get more detailed information on the diversity at Southern Adventist University.
The overall average net price of Southern Adventist is $16,772. 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 Southern Adventist
| $0-30 K | $30K-48K | $48-75 | $75-110K | $110K + |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $19,100 | $20,914 | $23,907 | $27,508 | $29,508 |
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 price for a school. For more information on the sticker price of Southern Adventist, see our tuition and fees and room and board pages.
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 Southern Adventist, approximately 42% of students took out student loans averaging $6,357 a year. That adds up to $25,428 over four years for those students. The student loan default rate is 3.2%. 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 Southern Adventist University.
The pay for some majors is higher than others, but on average, students who graduate with a bachelor’s degree from Southern Adventist University make about $53,723 a year during their first few years of employment after graduation. This is in the same neighborhood of the average college graduate’s salary of $49,219 per year. However, certain majors may produce higher-paying graduates.
See which majors at Southern Adventist University make the most money.
Southern Adventist University is a private not-for-profit institution situated in Collegedale, Tennessee. Collegedale is considered a suburb and offers tranquility and safety near the excitement of a city center. Get more details about the location of Southern Adventist University.
Get in touch with Southern Adventist University can be found below.
| Contact Details | |
|---|---|
| Address: | 4881 Taylor Cir, Collegedale, TN 37315-0370 |
| Phone: | 4232362000 |
| Website: | www.southern.edu |
| Facebook: | www.facebook.com/SouthernAdventistUniversity |
| Twitter: | twitter.com/SouthernNews |
During the most recent year for which we have data, students from 25 majors graduated from Southern Adventist University. The following table lists the most popular undergraduate majors along with the average salary graduates from those majors make.
| Most Popular Majors | Completions | Average Salary of Graduates |
|---|---|---|
| Multi-Disciplinary Studies | 660 | NA |
| Nursing | 217 | $58,264 |
| General Biology | 53 | NA |
| Social Work | 33 | $45,098 |
| Health & Physical Education | 27 | NA |
| Business Administration & Management | 26 | $32,843 |
| Clinical & Counseling Psychology | 25 | $38,217 |
| Theological & Ministerial Studies | 20 | NA |
| Teacher Education Grade Specific | 17 | $41,420 |
| General Psychology | 17 | NA |
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.
1,101 students took at least one online class at Southern Adventist University.
Learn more about online learning at Southern Adventist University.
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