Pacific Lutheran University Overview

Pacific Lutheran University is a private not-for-profit institution situated in Tacoma, Washington. PLU is located in a safe and convenient suburb.

What Is Pacific Lutheran University Known For?

• The doctor's degree is the highest award offered at PLU.
• In a recent academic period65% of the faculty were full-time.
• After graduation, PLU bachelor's degree recipients go on to jobs where they make $66,990 a year. That's about 64% more than their peers at other schools.
• On average, it takes about 4.2 years for students from PLU to earn a bachelor's degree. This is excellent when compared to the average of 4.4 years.

Where Is Pacific Lutheran University?

Contact details for PLU are given below.

	Contact Details
Address:	12180 Park Ave South, Tacoma, WA 98447-0003
Phone:	253-535-7411
Website:	www.plu.edu

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How Do I Get Into PLU?

You can apply to PLU online at: www.plu.edu/admission/first-year/

Admission Requirements for PLU

Submission	Required?
High School GPA	1
High School Rank	5
High School Transcript	1
College Prep Program	5
Recommendations	1
SAT or ACT Scores	5
TOEFL	5

How Hard Is It To Get Into PLU?

Since PLU has an acceptance rate of 89%, it is not too hard to gain acceptance into the school. Still, you need to be sure you complete your application in full and send in any other requested documents.

Approximately 41% of accepted students are men and 55% are women. The acceptance rate for men is 87%, and the acceptance rate for women is 90%.

Average Test Scores

About 4% of students accepted to PLU submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 640 and 718. Math scores were between 613 and 705.

PLU received ACT scores from 1% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT English scores ranged between 27 and 34. Math scores were between 22 and 0. Composite scores were between 27 and 30.

Can I Afford Pacific Lutheran University?

The overall average net price of PLU is $34,271. 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 PLU, approximately 49% of students took out student loans averaging $7,547 a year. That adds up to $30,188 over four years for those students.

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Pacific Lutheran University Undergraduate Student Diversity

There are 2,544 undergraduate students at PLU, with 2,486 being full-time and 58 being part-time.

There are also 363 graduate students at the school.

Gender Diversity

Of the 2,486 full-time undergraduates at PLU, 36% are male and 64% are female.

Racial-Ethnic Diversity

The racial-ethnic breakdown of Pacific Lutheran University students is as follows.

Race/Ethnicity	Number of Grads
Asian	265
Black or African American	91
Hispanic or Latino	344
White	1,406
International Students	36
Other Races/Ethnicities	344

Geographic Diversity

Washington students aren't the only ones who study at Pacific Lutheran University. At this time, 24 states are represented by the student population at the school.

Over 26 countries are represented at PLU. The most popular countries sending students to the school are Norway, China, and Vietnam.

Pacific Lutheran University Undergraduate Concentrations

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

Major	Bachelor’s	Graduate Certificate	Master’s	Doctor’s	TOTAL
Nursing	132	2	24	17	175
Business Administration & Management	70	0	25	0	95
Teacher Education Grade Specific	15	0	76	0	91
Health & Physical Education	41	0	8	0	49
General Biology	43	0	0	0	43
General Psychology	41	0	0	0	41
Writing Studies	13	0	12	0	25
Communication & Media Studies	23	0	0	0	23
Computer Science	18	0	0	0	18
Sociology	18	0	0	0	18
Social Work	18	0	0	0	18
Music	18	0	0	0	18
Mental & Social Health Services	0	0	17	0	17
International Studies	16	0	0	0	16
Drama & Theater Arts	16	0	0	0	16
History	15	0	0	0	15
Criminology	15	0	0	0	15
Political Science & Government	15	0	0	0	15
Natural Resources Conservation	14	0	0	0	14
Chemistry	14	0	0	0	14
Economics	14	0	0	0	14
Romance Languages	13	0	0	0	13
Physics	13	0	0	0	13
Management Sciences & Quantitative Methods	0	0	11	0	11
Mathematics	11	0	0	0	11
Geological & Earth Sciences	11	0	0	0	11
Anthropology	11	0	0	0	11
Fine & Studio Arts	11	0	0	0	11
Religious Studies	10	0	0	0	10
Teacher Education Subject Specific	8	0	0	0	8
Ethnic Studies	7	0	0	0	7
Other Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies	5	0	0	0	5
General English Literature	3	0	0	0	3
Area Studies	1	0	0	0	1
Germanic Languages	1	0	0	0	1
Philosophy	1	0	0	0	1
Accounting	0	0	0	0	0
Entrepreneurial Studies	0	0	0	0	0
Educational Administration	0	0	0	0	0
Health & Medical Administrative Services	0	0	0	0	0
Applied Mathematics	0	0	0	0	0
TOTAL	675	2	173	17	867

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 Joe Mabel under License

More about our data sources and methodologies.