What kind of school it is, in terms you can use
Beloit College is a private, nonprofit, four-year college focused on the arts and sciences. The federal government, through the Carnegie Classification, describes it as a small, highly residential school: at least half of its undergraduate students live in institution-provided housing, and at least 8 out of every 10 attend full time. It also places Beloit in its selective admissions group.
Highly residential is not just a label. It means that, if your child attends, they will likely live on campus, and that brings a separate cost—room and board are not included in tuition; they are charged separately. Ask for that cost in writing before comparing this school with any other.
It is in Beloit, Wisconsin, within Rock County, in the Janesville-Beloit metropolitan area. That tells you where it is, not how to get there or how far away it feels. If your child were considering living at home, the only way to know for sure is to drive the route on a weekday, at the exact time of their classes. The map almost never tells the whole truth.
The highest credential level it reports offering is the bachelor’s degree. That is an institutional fact, not a promise about the specific major your child is interested in: verify the program before assuming anything.
And one clarification worth making up front: Beloit College is not listed as a historically Black college or university, tribal college or university, or land-grant institution. Of the 3,012 colleges and universities in this directory, 138 have at least one of those three designations. Beloit’s absence from that list says nothing about which students it serves today, how many Latino students are on campus, or how your child will feel there. Ask directly which cultural centers and student organizations exist now.
The size of the community and who else lives there
Beloit is small. It had 948 students enrolled in the official fall count, all of them undergraduates, placing it in the category of schools with fewer than 1,000 students. Compared with 941 similar private, selective, four-year schools, it is on the smaller side: 7 out of every 10 of those schools, or more, have more students.
Small is neither better nor worse. It is a condition that raises a specific question: whether the courses in your child’s major are offered every semester or only once a year. That affects how long it takes to graduate.
Within that undergraduate population, 17 out of every 100 students identified as Hispanic or Latino in fall 2023. They are not a majority, but neither are they a rarity—and among the 941 selective private schools in this census that report the data, that proportion is in the top quartile. It is worth stating the limitation of this comparison: peers are grouped by school type, not by state, and that matters, especially in a place like Wisconsin. There are almost no adults older than 25 in this undergraduate population—just 3 out of every 100—and the balance between men and women is nearly even, with women making up 52 out of every 100.
How the academic year is structured
The calendar is organized by semesters, two long terms of about 15 weeks. Beloit reported that it accepts credit from AP exams, but not from life experience, and that it enrolls high school students in college courses for credit through a formal dual-enrollment program.
Accepting AP does not mean the school awards credit for every exam. It does not say what score is required or whether those credits will count toward your child’s specific major. Ask for the equivalency evaluation in writing before enrolling. Do not budget for the savings until you have it in hand.
In the most recently reported year, Beloit awarded 211 bachelor’s degrees across 18 fields of study. The largest, social sciences, accounted for 26 out of every 100 degrees—no other field surpassed it, but it does not account for most degrees either. Eighteen reported fields are not 18 complete majors: one field may group several programs, and a row may report zero. Verify the exact program.
The ratio of students to instructional staff, measured in full-time equivalents, is 11 to 1—a low figure compared with similar schools. But this aggregate ratio does not tell you the actual size of a first-year class. It is a clue, not a direct measurement.
The academic pathways the institution reports
Beloit reports structured study-abroad opportunities and several pathways related to teacher certification: preparation for certification below the postsecondary level, preparation in certain teacher-specialization areas, and state approval for initial certification. If your family is interested in any of these pathways, this is a good starting point for asking directly what they involve in practice.
Getting in: what they require and who is admitted
This is not an open-admissions school. Beloit reviews specific components before saying yes. Of the nine considerations measured by this report, excluding admissions tests and legacy status, four are required: the high school transcript, high school GPA, personal essay, and, when applicable, an English-proficiency exam. Put simply: gathering paperwork is not enough here. Your child has to write.
Other components are not required, but they are considered if you submit them: class rank, the rigor of the courses taken, letters of recommendation, a portfolio or competency test, work experience, and whether a family member attended the school. That last component—legacy status—is something your child cannot change. If it does not apply, do not spend energy on it. Spend that energy on what is within your child’s control.
The published application fee is $0.
In the 2023 cycle, 3,914 people applied for admission as first-year students. Of those applicants, 2,245 were offered a place: 57 out of every 100. The result is almost evenly split. Admission is neither automatic nor a lottery—the application is genuinely reviewed. Compared with 942 similar selective private schools, that rate is on the lower side: 7 out of every 10 schools in that group, or more, accepted a higher percentage.
But there is a second figure that almost no family knows, and it changes the picture completely: out of every 100 admitted students, only 10 ultimately enrolled. One out of ten. The other nine already had an acceptance in hand and did not take it. That is not a stain on the school—the federal record does not say why each person made that decision. What it does tell you, and what is useful to you, is that other people’s decisions say nothing about what the school will offer you. Wait for your own letter with your net price. That number, not other students’ enrollment rate, is what determines whether this school stays on your list.
Beloit reported that the SAT and ACT are not required: it has a test-optional policy. Among the cohort that enrolled, only 8 out of every 100 submitted SAT scores—just 17 students. With a sample that small, the ranges reported by the government—between 630 and 720 in reading and writing and between 580 and 640 in mathematics for the middle half—do not function as a cutoff or a guarantee. Do not treat them as a magic number that must be reached.
Regarding transfers: in fall 2023, 22 students arrived at Beloit for the first time after studying at another institution. This is a count of people, not a proportion, and it places the school in the lower half among its peers on this measure. The transfer-out rate—how many of those who entered here transferred elsewhere—is not reported in this file. That does not mean no one transfers; it means that data is unavailable.
What it costs, in numbers you can see
At Beloit College, among 25 first-time, full-time, credential-seeking students who received federal Title IV aid and whose EFC records showed family income below $30,000, the average net price was $16,637. Among 30 students in the same population with EFC family income from $48,001 to $75,000, it was $18,491; among 39 students with EFC family income above $110,000, it was $28,465. For dependent students, the income band combines their parents’ income with their own.
The difference between the average for the lowest-income band, which included 25 students, and the average for the highest-income band, which included 39 students, is $11,828. Among first-year students who received any grant or scholarship aid, the average was $24,941.
$16,637 was the average net price for the lowest-income families in academic year 2022-23. That does not mean it is what your family will pay. It helps you decide whether it is worth requesting the financial aid letter.
None of these figures is a quote for your child. The income bands in this profile describe first-time, full-time, credential-seeking students who received federal Title IV aid; at public institutions, they use the in-state or in-district rate. The overall average for students receiving grant or scholarship aid, when shown, describes first-time, full-time, credential-seeking students who received federal, state, local, or institutional grants or scholarships. The figure that matters is the aid letter sent to you. In the meantime, use the net price calculator on the school’s website.
How families pay in practice: grants, scholarships, and loans
Here, receiving aid is the norm, not the exception: 98 out of every 100 degree-seeking students received some grant or scholarship aid that does not have to be repaid. Among those who received it, the average was $44,009 for the year. That is real money, but it is not a price—the average includes people who received much more and people who received much less. Pell Grants, the federal aid for families with demonstrated financial need, reached 31 out of every 100 students.
And here is the hard truth, the one that cannot be softened: 54 out of every 100 undergraduate students at Beloit received a federal student loan in the 2022-23 school year. More than half. Among those who borrowed, the average amount per borrower that year was $6,301. Compared with 942 similar schools, this proportion of students with loans falls in the middle: neither among the highest nor among the lowest.
Financing with debt is common here. If your child borrowed a similar amount in each of the four years, the total would be around $25,204, not including interest. That figure is decided before the first signature, not at the end of the journey. And one distinction matters: this average covers only federal loans in the student’s name. It does not include Parent PLUS loans that parents sometimes sign for, bank debt, or credit-card debt. Nor is it the total debt someone has upon graduating—to determine that, you would have to add all four years, and that figure is not in this report.
Beloit also reports a prepaid tuition plan and an installment payment plan as available mechanisms for managing the cost.
Campus life, learning format, and support
Beloit has institution-provided housing. No first-time, full-time student is universally required to live there—but that does not mean no program has such a rule. It also offers meal plans, although the number of meals per week varies by plan. The reported maximum housing capacity is 1,148 students. The existence of housing does not guarantee that a bed will be available for your child: ask in writing for the year’s rate, the application deadline, and whether a place is guaranteed or applicants may be placed on a waiting list.
In its most recent report, Beloit did not indicate any ROTC opportunities. That does not prove there is no nearby pathway—it says only that the field was not marked. If that scholarship or career path matters to your family, ask about it directly before ruling it out.
It does compete in intercollegiate athletics and is affiliated with the NCAA—it reports membership for football, basketball, baseball, and cross-country or track and field. That does not say which division each sport competes in or whether it offers athletic scholarships. Have that conversation with the coach, in writing.
It offers distance education at the undergraduate level, but it is the exception, not the rule: only 1 out of every 100 students took all of their classes remotely; the other 99 took at least one class in person. It does not report any complete program that can be finished entirely through distance education.
The library operates with paid staff, and its annual expenditures exceeded the $100,000 threshold recorded by the government. It has physical and digital materials and participates in interlibrary lending. Exceeding that threshold does not guarantee that it has databases specific to your child’s major—ask about those by the name of the major.
Among the services the institution reports are combined academic and career counseling, employment services for current students, placement services for program completers, participation in the Yellow Ribbon program for veterans, and a published address for services for people with disabilities.
Who stays, who graduates
Here we reach the question that truly matters to a family: if your child enrolls, will they stay? Will they graduate?
Of the cohort of 232 first-time, full-time students who entered in fall 2022, 200 met the official retention criterion the following year—they were still enrolled or had already graduated. That is 86 out of every 100, a high proportion: compared with 930 similar selective private schools, Beloit ranks near the top. But a high retention figure is not a final graduation rate—it combines two different groups without separating them and does not reveal what happened to everyone else.
For the six-year graduation rate, of the 323 students who began bachelor’s-degree programs in 2017, 217 had graduated from Beloit: 67 out of every 100. At four years, that figure falls to 57 out of every 100—a ten-point difference between waiting two additional years and not waiting. Compared with 920 similar schools, at least half of the group reported an equal or lower proportion of graduates. This calculation follows first-time, full-time students; it does not include students who transferred in or those who began part time. A missing row in the data does not automatically become zero.
The longer, eight-year view follows a different cohort: 436 students who entered between July 2015 and June 2016. As of August 2023, 75 out of every 100 had earned a degree or certificate from Beloit—seven out of ten, and a little more. Among Pell Grant recipients, that figure was 70 out of every 100, six points below the group without Pell Grants. Compared with 935 similar schools, Beloit ranks in the top quartile on this measure.
A high percentage is not a promise about your child. It describes a cohort that entered nearly a decade ago, under circumstances that are no longer exactly the same as today’s. What you can do with this number is ask the school a specific question: what support exists now, and whether it has data for more recent cohorts.
What these numbers cannot tell you
Nothing above tells you how your child will feel walking across that campus in October. It does not tell you whether the admissions counselor will answer an email quickly, whether your child will actually like the meal plan, or whether the professor who teaches the subject that interests them most is still teaching there. Federal data is the firm ground on which you can stand to ask the right questions. It is not the complete landscape.
And it is not a verdict. These figures do not make Beloit a “good” or “bad” school: it is a small, selective school with a high sticker price and real aid, where most students stay and a substantial share graduate. That is what the numbers say. What they mean for your family depends on three things that only you and your child can bring together: what your child wants and has built so far, what your family can afford, and how well what Beloit actually offers fits what you are looking for.
You now know one of those three pieces in detail. If your child is just starting to build a college list, ask what they want to study and how far from home they can imagine living. If they have already applied, wait together for the net price letter before ruling the school out or getting too excited. And if this school is already among the finalists, make a list of the specific questions these data leave open—housing, AP credits, athletic scholarships, support specific to the major—and take them directly to admissions, in writing.
That is the work that falls to you: understand the money, support the decision, and avoid losing sight of any path because you did not know the map. The rest—the effort, the curiosity, the life that comes afterward—is up to your child.
Source note: the information in this article comes from data reported by Beloit College to the U.S. Department of Education’s IPEDS system, primarily from the 2022-23 and 2023-24 cycles, with comparisons within a census of 3,012 institutions. Best College Aid does not represent Beloit College or any government agency; this article organizes and explains public data and does not constitute personalized admissions advice.