Interesting Facts About Salem College

If you’d like to learn a lot about Salem College in a short amount of time, check out the list of fast facts below.

Basic Info About Salem

  • Salem College is a four-year liberal arts school for women. Women and men ages 23 and older are accepted into undergraduate programs through the Fleer Center for Adult Education and to the graduate programs in teacher education and Master of Music.
  • We are the thirteenth oldest college in the United States, according to the American Council on Education in Washington, DC, and the oldest educational institution for women and girls in the nation.
  • Motto: “Knowledge and Virtue”
  • Salem offers four undergraduate degrees (bachelor of arts, bachelor of science, bachelor of music, and bachelor of science in business administration); two graduate degrees (master of arts in teaching, master of education); teacher licensure (Elementary Education K-6, General Curriculum Special Education K-12, Middle/Secondary Content Area 6-12, Second Language - French and Spanish - K-12 and Art Education K-12; add-on licensure is available in Academically and Intellectually Gifted (AIG), Birth-Kindergarten, Reading, and English as a Second Language); and four certificate programs, in Accounting, Not-for-Profit Management, and Injury-Preventive Keyboard Technique. 

Salem Population

  • Salem’s total enrollment of 940 includes traditional-age college students (all women), adults enrolled in the graduate degree programs in education, as well as women and men ages 23 and up who take courses through the Fleer Center for Adult Education. 
  • Student to faculty ratio is 15:1; 90 percent of professors have PhDs or terminal degrees in their field; 70 percent are women.
  • Salem College has the most racially and ethnically diverse student body of any local institution: 45 percent of traditional students are students of color.

Salem Recognition & Value

  • Salem College’s law school admission rate is 100 percent.
  • Money magazine has named Salem one of the top 10 “Best Buys” among women’s colleges seven years in a row. (We were also ranked in the top 150 “Best Buys” for all colleges and universities in the US and one of the top 25 “Best Buys” among liberal arts colleges in the Southeast.)
  • Salem was the first college in North Carolina to add a master’s degree program in which students can earn licensure to teach children from birth to kindergarten.
  • Salem is ranked one of the top “Character-Building Colleges” in the nation by the John Templeton Foundation, in large part because of the unique Salem Impact program.
  • Women who attend women’s colleges are twice as likely as their peers in co-ed institutions to pursue careers and advanced degrees in the sciences. At Salem, our science programs are among our most popular. Salem’s Women in Science program is designed to provide academic and career support for students interested in pursuing careers in science or mathematics.
  • Since 2010, students graduating with a degree from the Natural Sciences or Mathematics departments at Salem College have achieved a 89.6% acceptance rate into health science-related programs, including dental, graduate research, medical, occupational therapy, osteopathic medical, pharmacy, physician assistant, and physical therapy schools. This data was collected using a voluntary survey to which Salem graduates since 2010 were asked to report on acceptance rates and career outcomes

Salem Athletics 

Student Achievement Data

Retention of First-time Full-time First-Year Cohorts:

Fall 2015-Fall 2016    76%
Fall 2016-Fall 2017    75%
Fall 2017-Fall 2018    72%
Fall 2018-Fall 2019    76%
Fall 2019-Fall 2020    50%

Retention of all undergraduates:

(excluding those who graduated)

Spring 2016-Fall 2016            89%
Spring 2017-Fall 2017            88%
Spring 2018-Fall 2018            86%
Spring 2019-Fall 2019            88%
Spring 2020-Fall 2020            80%

Graduation Rates

(6-year rates, based on the first-time full-time first-year cohort)

All FTFTFY students:            59%
Pell Grant recipients:              52%
Stafford Loan recipients:        67%
Black/African-American:        62%
Hispanic:                                 56%

Placement Rates

(based on a survey of graduates Dec 2016-Dec 2018, with a 42% response rate)

Employed                    70.27%
Grad/Prof School        25.4%
Employed or in
  A grad program         96%

Salem College Academic Programs with CIP Codes

Contact Salem College for Additional Information

We hope you found our list of Salem facts helpful. If you have additional questions about our school history or academic offerings, please visit the relevant pages, and feel free to contact us at 336-721-2600.

Salem College is proud to be the oldest continuously operating educational institution for women in the US, among its many other interesting and praiseworthy distinctions.

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