California State University - San Marcos Overview

California State University - San Marcos is a public institution situated in San Marcos, California. San Marcos is a good match for students who enjoy the safety and convenience of the suburbs.

What Is California State University - San Marcos Known For?

• The 4% student loan default rate at CSUSM is better than the national rate of 10.1%. That's a good sign that you may be able to pay off student loans easier than your peers at other schools can.
• The highest award offered at CSUSM is the doctor's degree.
• For the 2017-2018 academic year, 47% of the faculty were full-time.
• A student who earns a bachelor's degree from CSUSM makes roughly $47,300 a year. This is 16% more than their peers from other colleges and universities.

California State University - San Marcos Rankings

These rankings may look different from those published by other outlets, because we use an outcomes-based approach rather than a subjective one. We get our data from a number of places, including the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) and the College Scorecard. For more information, check out our rankings and methodology page.

CSUSM has been awarded the following overall awards by our latest rankings.

Rank	Ranking Name	Share
#88	Best Graduate Certificate Schools	Tweet It - Post It

Program Level Awards

These are highlights of some of the most noteworthy awards granted to specific programs at CSUSM.

Rank	Ranking Name	Share
#3	Best Value Communication Sciences Graduate Certificate Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#17	Most Popular Family, Consumer & Human Sciences Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#26	Best Value Physics Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#30	Best Value Biochemistry & Biophysics Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#38	Most Popular Social Sciences Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#40	Best Value Physical Sciences Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#45	Best Value Chemistry Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#69	Best Health Professions Graduate Certificate Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#130	Best Value Teacher Education Grade Specific Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#143	Best Value Education Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It

Awards From Around the Web

The following table lists some notable awards CSUSM has earned from around the web.

Rank	Ranking Name	Source
#70	Best Early Childhood Education Schools	College Factual
#147	Best Teacher Education Grade Specific Schools	College Factual
#154	Best Registered Nursing Schools	College Factual
#160	Best Nursing Schools	Nursing Degree Search
#180	Best Nursing Schools	College Factual
#289	Best Health Professions Schools	College Factual

Where Is California State University - San Marcos?

Contact details for CSUSM are given below.

	Contact Details
Address:	333 S Twin Oaks Valley Rd, San Marcos, CA 92096-0001
Phone:	760-750-4000
Facebook:	https://www.facebook.com/csusm
Twitter:	https://twitter.com/csusmnews

How Do I Get Into CSUSM?

You can apply to CSUSM online at: https://www2.calstate.edu/apply

Admission Requirements for CSUSM

Submission	Required?
High School GPA	required
High School Rank	neither required nor recommended
High School Transcript	required
College Prep Program	required
Recommendations	neither required nor recommended
SAT or ACT Scores	required
TOEFL	neither required nor recommended

How Hard Is It To Get Into CSUSM?

The acceptance rate at California State University - San Marcos is 79%. This means that is not quite as selective as some schools, but you'll still need to submit a good application if you want to be considered by the admissions department.

Approximately 35% of accepted students are men and 65% are women. The acceptance rate for men is 76%, and the acceptance rate for women is 81%.

Average Test Scores

About 94% of students accepted to CSUSM submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 480 and 570. Math scores were between 470 and 560.

CSUSM received ACT scores from 25% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT English scores ranged between 15 and 22. Math scores were between 16 and 22. Composite scores were between 17 and 22.

Can I Afford California State University - San Marcos?

The overall average net price of CSUSM is $27,745. The affordability of the school largely depends on your financial need since net price varies by income group.

The net price is calculated by adding tuition, room, board and other costs and subtracting financial aid.

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 CSUSM, approximately 36% of students took out student loans averaging $5,834 a year. That adds up to $23,336 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at CSUSM is 4.2%. 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.

California State University - San Marcos Undergraduate Student Diversity

There are 15,040 undergraduate students at CSUSM, with 12,381 being full-time and 2,659 being part-time.

There are also 1,327 graduate students at the school.

Gender Diversity

Of the 12,381 full-time undergraduates at CSUSM, 37% are male and 63% are female.

Racial-Ethnic Diversity

The racial-ethnic breakdown of California State University - San Marcos students is as follows.

Race/Ethnicity	Number of Grads
Asian	1,126
Black or African American	386
Hispanic or Latino	6,156
White	3,195
International Students	441
Other Races/Ethnicities	1,077

Geographic Diversity

California students aren't the only ones who study at California State University - San Marcos. At this time, 22 states are represented by the student population at the school.

Over 56 countries are represented at CSUSM. The most popular countries sending students to the school are China, Japan, and Saudi Arabia.

Online Learning at California State University - San Marcos

In 2019-2020, 16,353 students took at least one online class at the school.

The following chart shows how the online learning population at CSUSM has changed over the last few years.

This school is the 25th most popular in California for online learning according to the online graduations recorded by the Department of Education for the academic year 2019-2020.

Online Affordability Rankings of CSUSM

The following table shows how CSUSM is ranked for affordability for both in-state and out-of-state students among colleges and universities that are not mostly online.

Major	Tuition for In-State Students	Tuition for Out-of-State Students
Information Technology	#19	#58
General Education	#42	#80
Sociology	#49	#93
Computer & Information Sciences	#67	#112

Online Affordability Rankings of CSUSM Rankings

The following table shows how CSUSM is ranked for affordability for both in-state and out-of-state students among colleges and universities that are mostly online.

Major	Tuition for In-State Students	Tuition for Out-of-State Students
Information Technology	#14	#100
Computer & Information Sciences	#20	#83
Education	#31	#112
Educational Administration	#43	#145

Online Growth Rankings of CSUSM

The average growth rate over the last four years of online students at California State University - San Marcos was 962.2%. This is the #112 largest growth rate of all schools that are mostly online. This refers to all students at CSUSM regardless of major.

The following table shows the 1-year growth rate of CSUSM majors that offer at least one online course. This table only includes majors with positive growth.

Major	1-Year Growth Rate
Communication Sciences	4%
Computer & Information Sciences	21%

The table below shows how the average growth rate over 4 years at CSUSM ranks compared to all other mostly online schools that offer a specific major. Note that the majors may or may not be offered online at CSUSM.

Major	Growth Rate Rank
Information Technology	#1
Communication Sciences	#1
Computer & Information Sciences	#4
Educational Administration	#7
Health Professions	#18
Education	#34

When we speak of partially online, we are referring to schools whose online population is less than 50% of its total student body. Mostly online refers to those with online populations greater than or equal to 50%.

California State University - San Marcos Undergraduate Concentrations

The table below shows the number of awards for each concentration.

Major	Bachelor’s	Graduate Certificate	Master’s	TOTAL
Business Administration & Management	613	0	52	665
Nursing	345	0	17	362
General Psychology	307	0	10	317
Human Development & Family Studies	306	0	0	306
Communication & Media Studies	278	0	0	278
Criminology	278	0	0	278
Sociology	254	0	10	264
Health & Physical Education	207	0	8	215
General Biology	175	0	10	185
Liberal Arts General Studies	185	0	0	185
Computer Science	161	0	10	171
General English Literature	89	0	8	97
Communication Sciences	53	5	35	93
General Visual & Performing Arts	93	0	0	93
Teacher Education Grade Specific	86	0	0	86
History	78	0	5	83
Political Science & Government	68	0	0	68
Economics	66	0	0	66
Public Health	0	0	64	64
Social Work	0	0	61	61
Natural Resources Conservation	57	0	0	57
Biotechnology	30	0	15	45
Romance Languages	38	0	4	42
General Education	0	0	35	35
Biochemistry, Biophysics & Molecular Biology	34	0	0	34
Anthropology	31	0	0	31
Special Education	0	0	29	29
Mathematics	20	0	5	25
General Social Sciences	21	0	0	21
Educational Administration	0	0	19	19
Physics	17	0	0	17
Ethnic Studies	15	0	0	15
Chemistry	15	0	0	15
International Studies	14	0	0	14
Music	11	0	0	11
Information Technology	0	0	6	6
Other Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies	4	0	0	4
Accounting	0	0	0	0
Teacher Education Subject Specific	0	0	0	0
Clinical/Medical Laboratory Science	0	0	0	0
Health/Medical Prep Programs	0	0	0	0
Health Sciences & Services	0	0	0	0
Natural Resource Management	0	0	0	0
Clinical, Counseling & Applied Psychology	0	0	0	0
International Relations & National Security	0	0	0	0
TOTAL	3,949	5	403	4,357

References

*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.

• College Factual
• National Center for Education Statistics
• Image Credit: By Eamuscatuli under License

More about our data sources and methodologies.