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Trends by state

Trends by state

Tennessee

44 colleges on the site: 11 public, 31 private nonprofit, 2 for-profit. Their undergraduates fell 8% in total since fall 2014, to 154,587 today (36 of 44 Tennessee colleges in the panel).

Explore Tennessee's colleges

How Tennessee's colleges changed

The median Tennessee college, fall 2014 to fall 2024, against the national median (dashed) over the same .

Undergraduates

-16%

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

Applicants

+55%

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

No point for fall 2018 to fall 2022: fewer than 90% of this state's colleges reported.

Acceptance rate

+1.2 pts

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

No point for fall 2018 to fall 2022: fewer than 90% of this state's colleges reported.

Average total cost

-11%

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

Public and private

State stories are often public-system stories: a state's publics shrinking while its privates hold, or the reverse.

Public

10 colleges
Undergrads
-17%
Applicants
+82%
Acceptance rate
+0.4 pts
Average cost
-12%

Private nonprofit

25 colleges
Undergrads
-16%
Applicants
+31%
Acceptance rate
+1.2 pts
Average cost
-10%

Where Tennessee's first-years come from

Top sending states

  1. Tennessee (in-state)70%
  2. GA3%
  3. IL2%
  4. NC2%
  5. TX2%
  6. FL2%
  7. VA2%
  8. CA2%

Public:

8% → 11% (11 colleges)

Private nonprofit:

41% → 35% (31 colleges)

First-years crossing state lines, fall 2024

Inflow
9,970
Outflow
8,576
Net
+1,394

Tennessee's colleges enroll 1.2 first-years from other states for every Tennessee resident who starts college in another state, among four-year colleges on this site.

Colleges taking the most of the inflow

  1. The University of Tennessee-Knoxville24%
  2. Vanderbilt University12%
  3. Belmont University10%
  4. Southern Adventist University5%
  5. East Tennessee State University5%

One fall, over campus-based colleges only: not that fall, not for-profit, and not a campus that merged or split.

Biggest movers in Tennessee

The same as the national lists, restricted to Tennessee's colleges.

Applications surged

, fall 2014 to fall 2024

Median college: +59.1% (20 colleges ranked)

  1. 1Fisk University+348.9%2,544 → 11,421
  2. 2The University of Tennessee-Knoxville+287.0%15,442 → 59,764
  3. 3Tennessee Technological University+151.8%4,582 → 11,538
  4. 4Austin Peay State University+91.4%3,307 → 6,331
  5. 5East Tennessee State University+91.4%5,252 → 10,050
  6. 6Rhodes College+88.2%3,382 → 6,365
  7. 7The University of Tennessee-Martin+72.4%3,526 → 6,077
  8. 8Maryville College+66.2%2,036 → 3,383
  9. 9Belmont University+61.8%5,665 → 9,165
  10. 10Middle Tennessee State University+60.3%9,353 → 14,989

Sources:IPEDS Admissions survey, Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Fall Enrollment survey (distance education), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024About the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)

Top 10 and how it's ranked

Grew the most

, fall 2014 to fall 2024

Median college: −17.2% (31 colleges ranked)

  1. 1Cumberland University+80.3%1,167 → 2,104
  2. 2The University of Tennessee-Knoxville+42.2%21,396 → 30,418
  3. 3Belmont University+23.5%5,778 → 7,137
  4. 4Trevecca Nazarene University+8.0%1,609 → 1,737
  5. 5Southern Adventist University+6.5%2,603 → 2,773
  6. 6Vanderbilt University+5.7%6,818 → 7,208
  7. 7Lipscomb University+4.2%2,875 → 2,997

Sources:College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Fall Enrollment survey (distance education), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024About the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)

Top 7 and how it's ranked

Students pay much less

(in 2023–24 dollars), 2013–14 to 2023–24

Median college: −11.0% (32 colleges ranked)

  1. 1Bethel University−47.7%$27,823 → $14,548
  2. 2The University of Tennessee Southern−44.2%$31,929 → $17,804
  3. 3Le Moyne-Owen College−39.4%$13,912 → $8,428
  4. 4Baptist Health Sciences University−26.4%$19,937 → $14,666
  5. 5Rhodes College−23.4%$41,162 → $31,534
  6. 6Tennessee Technological University−19.4%$22,365 → $18,020
  7. 7Austin Peay State University−17.8%$19,883 → $16,335
  8. 7Cumberland University−17.8%$24,388 → $20,037
  9. 9Union University−17.5%$35,329 → $29,156
  10. 10East Tennessee State University−14.4%$23,774 → $20,349

Sources:IPEDS Institutional Characteristics survey, 2013–14 to 2023–24;IPEDS Student Financial Aid survey, 2013–14 to 2023–24;College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2013 to Fall 2024;inflation: BLS CPI-U, school-year averagesAbout the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)

Top 10 and how it's ranked

Public research universities

Tennessee's public R1 and R2 universities (Carnegie 2025), with their undergraduate change over the same window. No classification in the data means "flagship," so this is simply the state's public research universities.

How this was measured

  • Which colleges. Colleges with 300 or more undergraduates in both fall 2014 and fall 2024: 36 of 44 Tennessee colleges. It's a , so colleges entering or leaving the data don't look like change.
  • Average total cost is an academic-year figure, one year behind fall: 2013–14 to 2023–24, after inflation.
  • Out-of-state shares are collected in even-numbered falls only; odd years are gaps, not zeros.
  • Totals and medians both appear because they can diverge: a state's total can fall more (or less) than its median college when its biggest colleges move differently.
  • No policy attribution. This page shows what changed, not why; a state's mix of public, private, and for-profit colleges, and its system policies, aren't broken out as causes.
  • First-years crossing state lines is a single snapshot, fall 2024, over campus-based colleges only: colleges that fall, for-profit colleges, and campuses that merged or split are left out. It's the newest fall the site's per-college home-state tables cover, not this page's ten-year window.

Sources:College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Admissions survey, Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Institutional Characteristics survey, 2014–15 to 2023–24;IPEDS Student Financial Aid survey, 2014–15 to 2023–24;IPEDS Fall Enrollment survey (part C, residence of first-time students), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;inflation: BLS CPI-U, school-year averagesAbout the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)