St. Olaf ranks high among liberal arts colleges in the number of its graduates who earn doctoral degrees. The data below is based on the NSF Survey of Earned Doctorates and compares St. Olaf College to the other Baccalaureate-Arts & Sciences Colleges in the Carnegie 2018 classification.
Total Number of Doctorates Earned in Different Periods
| rank* | Institution | 2016- 2020 | 2014- 2018 | 2004- 2013 | 1994- 2003 | 1984- 1993 |
| 1 | Carleton College | 445 | 452 | 836 | 766 | 578 |
| 2 | Wesleyan University | 437 | 409 | 770 | 780 | 492 |
| 3 | Oberlin College | 399 | 448 | 883 | 1,107 | 955 |
| 3 | Swarthmore College | 399 | 433 | 732 | 770 | 548 |
| 5 | Vassar College | 378 | 357 | 595 | 503 | 406 |
| 6 | Williams College | 352 | 374 | 668 | 644 | 357 |
| 7 | Wellesley College | 340 | 337 | 603 | 608 | 544 |
| 8 | St. Olaf College | 321 | 304 (11th) | 533 (10th) | 599 (8th) | 454 (8th) |
| 9 | Smith College | 316 | 328 | 640 | 634 | 526 |
| 10 | Reed College | 313 | 311 | 570 | 517 | 437 |
* rank in most recent five years
St. Olaf Graduates, Degrees Earned by Discipline
Looking at specific disciplines, the following table shows the number of Ph.D.s awarded to St. Olaf graduates during the period 2011-2020 and the rank of St. Olaf among Bac-A&S colleges as a source of Ph.D.s in those disciplines.
Discipline – broad category |
Number |
Rank |
Discipline – detailed category |
||
| Life Sciences | 203 | 3 |
| Agricultural sciences and natural resources | 18 | 1 |
| Biological and biomedical sciences | 160 | 3 |
| Health sciences | 25 | 4 |
| Physical sciences and earth sciences | ||
| Chemistry | 39 | 6 |
| Math & Computer Sciences | 51 | 5 |
| Math & Statistics | 48 | 2 |
| Education | 50 | 5 |
| Education administration | 15 | 3 |
| Teaching fields | 15 | 3 |
| Engineering | ||
| Bioengineering and biomedical engineering | 5 | 6 |
| Other non-Science & Engineering | 23 | 10 |
| Business management and administration | 8 | 10 |
| Non-S&E fields not elsewhere classified | 13 | 1 |
|
Humanities |
||
| Other humanities and arts | 56 | 9 |
Note: We have selected disciplines or groups of disciplines where St. Olaf ranks among the top 10; please contact the IE&A Office for other disciplines. Not all detailed disciplines are available in the NCSES Interactive Data Tool
Sources:
Classification of Institutions: The Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education
Doctorates earned: Data compiled from the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) of the National Science Foundation (NSF), Survey of Earned Doctorates. Note that professional degrees, including Psy.D., D.Min., Pharm.D., M.D., etc. are not included.
Definition of rankings:
Rank assigned by total sum of doctorates earned by institutions’ alumni during each time period noted. Ranked positions of ties were skipped in order to reflect the total number of institutions with valid values for the given time period in the ranks.
2011-2020 data accessed March 2022, 2014-2018 data accessed August 2020, earlier data accessed via former WebCaspar database 1/6/2017 and 6/9/2017