Admissions & selectivity
Centre College Acceptance Rate & Admissions
What is the acceptance rate at Centre College?
Centre College’s reported acceptance rate is 54.4%.
- Acceptance rate · Fall 2024
- 54.4%
Source: College Scorecard · Fall 2024 admissions. Acceptance rates can change from year to year; this figure does not predict the current or next admission cycle.
Source: Centre College Common Data Set 2025-26, C1 · first-time, first-year students.
How to interpret the acceptance rate
Centre College admits 54.4% of applicants, well below the median of 75.7% for comparable institutions (same type and size). In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported 4,165 first-year applicants, 2,006 admitted students, and 357 who enrolled.
What SAT and ACT scores do enrolled Centre College students report?
In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, Centre College reported a middle-half SAT range of 1203 to 1410 among enrolled first-year students who submitted scores. Only 7% of the entering class submitted SAT scores.
The corresponding ACT range for enrolled submitters was 26 to 31, with 47% submitting ACT scores. The reported average high-school GPA was 3.80 among enrolled first-year students who submitted one; 98.3% of the entering class submitted a GPA.
Among entering students with a reported high-school class rank, 35% were in the highest tenth of their class and 66% in the highest quarter. 44% of the entering class reported a rank.
Those ranges reflect enrolled submitters, not admission cutoffs. Prospective students should weigh their own SAT results against the middle-half range of 1203 to 1410 from recent enrolled submitters. They should also weigh their ACT results against the range of 26 to 31.
The ranges below describe enrolled students who submitted test scores at Centre College. Use them as academic context, then check the university’s current testing policy for your application cycle.
7% of entering students submitted SAT scores
- 25th percentile
- 1203
- Median
- 1285
- 75th percentile
- 1410
CDS 2025-26 · enrolled first-year score submitters. This range is not an admission cutoff.
47% of entering students submitted ACT scores
- 25th percentile
- 26
- Median
- 28
- 75th percentile
- 31
CDS 2025-26 · enrolled first-year score submitters. This range is not an admission cutoff.
Source: Centre College Common Data Set 2025-26, C9 · Enrolled first-time, first-year score submitters.
Who enrolls at Centre College?
- Pell Grant recipients
- 22.6%
- Entering students outside the first-time, full-time group
- 6.4%
- First-year retention
- 87.5%
Retention source: College Scorecard; full-time first-year retention.
About these student measures
The entering-student group includes part-time entrants as well as other attendance patterns.
Centre College is a private nonprofit university in Danville, Kentucky, enrolling 1,400 undergraduates. The student body is drawn mostly from students who begin as first-year entrants, with an estimated 6.4% arriving as transfers or part-time students.
In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported 4,165 first-year applicants, 2,006 admitted, and 357 enrolled. For transfer students, it reported 107 applicants, 28 admitted, and 14 enrolled. 22.6% of undergraduates receive Pell Grants.
Centre College retains 87.5% of its first-time, full-time students after the first year, against a median of 74.2% for comparable institutions (same type and size). The six-year graduation rate for that cohort is 80.7%, which exceeds the peer median of 54.9%.
In its 2025-26 Common Data Set, the university reported a retention rate of 89% for the first-time, full-time fall 2024 entering class. Pell recipients in the first-time full-time cohort complete at 81.8%, which is 1.1 percentage points above the overall rate.
Enrolled students can expect persistence and completion outcomes that run ahead of the peer medians.
Data & methodology
Sources and reporting periods: methodology.
Analysis and methodology by Daniel Rogers, founder of College Azimuth.
Explanatory text is AI-assisted drafting checked against those figures; it is not an additional data source.
Admission rates describe past applicants, not an individual’s chance of admission; confirm requirements and deadlines with the institution.
Figure notes link to sources and limitations. About College Azimuth.