What your university actually requires

One of America's largest online universities — its eight-week undergraduate terms and discussion-post-driven courses define a genre of writing all its own.

160,000 students · est. 1932

America's largest competency-based university: no grades, no credit hours — just performance assessments (PAs) graded against detailed rubrics, mostly written in APA 7.

150,000 students · est. 1997

A giant of Christian online education whose APA-7-first writing culture and Liberty Way honor code shape every discussion post and dissertation.

100,000 students · est. 1971

The home of American Military University — the largest educator of US military personnel, where military memo culture meets APA 7 in eight-week online courses.

100,000 students · est. 1991

One of America's largest online universities, famous for its proprietary GCU Style that adapts APA 7 with a distinctive title-page template and heading system.

95,000 students · est. 1949

A multi-campus public research giant (20+ campuses) famous for engineering, earth sciences and the largest alumni dues-paying association.

88,000 students · est. 1855

The largest university in the US by enrollment and a pioneer of online education through ASU Online, with 400+ degree programs.

80,000 students · est. 1885

The original working-adult online university, famous for its weekly discussion-question format and the Center for Writing Excellence that supports it.

80,000 students · est. 1976

A senior military college and land-grant giant famous for engineering, agriculture and the most loyal alumni network in America.

74,000 students · est. 1876

One of the largest US universities by enrollment, famous for hospitality management, simulation engineering and its space-coast research ties.

69,000 students · est. 1963

The state university of New Jersey, famous for pharmacy, cooking science, and its 29,000-student New Brunswick main campus.

68,000 students · est. 1766

A flagship public university famous for its second-year writing requirement, agriculture college and massive medical center.

66,000 students · est. 1870

A global engineering powerhouse famous for computer science (the birthplace of the Mosaic browser) and top-ranked library science.

56,000 students · est. 1867

Florida's flagship public university, a top-5 public research school famous for engineering, agriculture and championship athletics.

55,000 students · est. 1853

A world-leading public research university famous for computer science (Allen School), medicine and marine research.

55,000 students · est. 1861

The Big Ten's northern flagship, famous for medical research (the first bone-marrow transplant), Carlson business and food science.

54,000 students · est. 1851

One of the largest universities in the US and a majority-Hispanic R1, famous for the Chaplin School of Hospitality (home of the South Beach Wine & Food Festival) and strong international business programs.

54,000 students · est. 1965

The UT System's flagship and one of the largest single-campus universities in the US, famous for engineering, business and the McCombs School.

53,000 students · est. 1883

A global private university with campuses in New York, Abu Dhabi and Shanghai, famous for Tisch arts programs and Stern business.

51,000 students · est. 1831

One of America's elite public universities, famous for the Ross School of Business, engineering and the nation's largest alumni body.

51,000 students · est. 1817

Home of the Online Writing Lab (OWL) — the most-used writing resource on Earth — plus elite engineering and aviation.

51,000 students · est. 1869

The original land-grant university, famous for agriculture, packaging science, communication and education research.

50,000 students · est. 1855

The birthplace of cooperative education, famous for design, architecture, criminal justice and aerospace engineering co-ops.

50,000 students · est. 1819

Wisconsin's flagship public university, famous for the Wisconsin Idea, journalism, engineering and heavy research funding.

50,000 students · est. 1848

An online university known for social-work, nursing and public-health programs where every paper carries a social-change framing and strict APA 7 mechanics.

50,000 students · est. 1970

A career-focused online university (business and IT since 1892) whose quarter system pairs weekly discussions with applied APA case papers.

50,000 students · est. 1892

A downtown Atlanta research university of about 50,000 students famous for its GPS Advising analytics, which helped nearly double graduation rates and close income-based gaps that peer campuses still report.

50,000 students · est. 1913

A leading public research university known for space science, optics and its top-ranked Eller College of Management.

49,000 students · est. 1885

A young top-50 public research university, famous for global health and infectious-disease research, the Morsani College of Medicine's downtown Water Street campus and one of the most diverse student bodies in Florida.

49,000 students · est. 1956

A private research powerhouse famous for its film school, Marshall business programs and Trojan alumni network.

47,000 students · est. 1880

One of the world's top engineering institutes, famous for its co-op program, aerospace research and the 'Helluva Engineer' culture.

47,000 students · est. 1885

The most-applied-to university in America, pairing elite research with the country's most diverse student body.

46,000 students · est. 1919

A major urban research university famous for its energy-industry ties, award-winning creative writing program and Tier One research status.

46,000 students · est. 1927

Famous for music (Jacobs), business (Kelley), informatics and the world's largest student-run media network.

46,000 students · est. 1820

The flagship of the UC system and one of the world's top research universities, famous for its Nobel-heavy faculty and free-speech history.

45,000 students · est. 1868

The Denton flagship whose College of Music granted America's first jazz studies degree in 1947, now one of the largest universities in Texas, with a College of Visual Arts and Design that anchors the region's creative economy and a journalism school named for the Mayborn family.

45,000 students · est. 1890

A Florida co-flagship and top-20 public, famous for its conservatory-style College of Motion Picture Arts, championship athletics and one of the strongest music programs in the Southeast.

44,000 students · est. 1851

Georgia's fastest riser — a 1963 charter that merged with Southern Polytechnic State University in 2015 and grew into one of the largest universities in the state, with the Coles College of Business, the Wellstar health colleges and a two-campus footprint in metro Atlanta's northwest corridor.

44,000 students · est. 1963

The flagship-scale UT campus at the midpoint of Dallas-Fort Worth, grown from an 1895 private college into one of Texas's largest universities, with one of the state's biggest nursing colleges, a deep engineering school, and a stadium-district address shared with the Cowboys and Rangers.

43,000 students · est. 1895

A La Jolla research giant built in 1960 on a eucalyptus grove above the Pacific, with Scripps Institution of Oceanography at its core, a biotech-and-health-sciences pipeline, and a residential-college system in which every incoming class inherits its own writing sequence.

42,000 students · est. 1960

The first chartered state university in America, famous for journalism (Peabody Awards), business and its historic campus.

41,000 students · est. 1785

A top public research university famous for cybersecurity (a NSA hub), aerospace engineering and the iSchool.

41,000 students · est. 1856

The Crimson Tide flagship, famous for its massive scholarship-driven out-of-state enrollment, business school and communications programs.

40,000 students · est. 1831

A West Texas flagship famous for the Vietnam Center and Archive, wind science and engineering born on the South Plains and a Spanish-Renaissance campus plan built from Lubbock's own red brick.

40,000 students · est. 1923

One of the largest campuses in the CSU system at about 40,000 students, known for its communications and business programs, the 26-acre Fullerton Arboretum, and four national baseball championships.

40,000 students · est. 1957

The University Farm founded in 1905 that became a world research campus — a top-ranked veterinary school, the country's leading viticulture and enology program, and a bicycle-town campus west of Sacramento where the agricultural origins still shape the majors and the roads.

40,000 students · est. 1905

The Rocky Mountain flagship, famous for aerospace (LASP instruments fly on NASA missions), physics and environmental studies.

39,000 students · est. 1876

Virginia's largest public university, famous for the Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution, an economics department tied to the Mercatus Center and Schar School policy programs next door to Washington.

39,000 students · est. 1972

A high-research CSU campus known for international business, public health and its strong border-studies programs.

38,000 students · est. 1897

The state's land-grant STEM powerhouse, famous for textiles, veterinary medicine, engineering and Centennial Campus research parks.

38,000 students · est. 1887

Virginia's land-grant STEM university, famous for engineering, architecture, agriculture and the Hokie-stone campus.

38,000 students · est. 1872

One of the largest CSU campuses and among America's most diverse, famous for the Walter Pyramid, a Film and Electronic Arts program with deep Hollywood supply lines and a nursing program that fills regional hospital rosters.

38,000 students · est. 1949

The only Texas university to graduate a US president — Lyndon Johnson, class of 1930 — now one of the state's largest campuses, famous for mass communication, geography and the San Marcos River running through town.

38,000 students · est. 1899

A major private research university famous for communication (COM), hotel administration, and the Kilachand Honors College.

37,000 students · est. 1839

The oldest public university on the West Coast and Silicon Valley's biggest talent pipeline, famous for engineering, computer science and an Animation/Illustration program that feeds Pixar and Disney.

36,000 students · est. 1857

The 1960s UC campus built as a ring around Aldrich Park, known for the Anteater mascot chosen in 1965, a health-sciences cluster anchored by the UCI Medical Center, and a computer-science program tied into Orange County's tech corridor.

36,000 students · est. 1964

An online university famous for its FlexPath self-paced format and one of the most-used university writing centers on the web.

35,000 students · est. 1993

The online university formed from Ashford University in 2020, running five-week courses where weekly discussion posts and short APA papers carry the grade.

35,000 students · est. 1918

Purdue system's online campus (built from Kaplan University) — its writing center extends the Purdue OWL tradition into every online course.

35,000 students · est. 2018

South Carolina's flagship, famous for the Darla Moore School's #1-ranked undergraduate international business major and University 101, the first-year seminar the rest of the country copied.

35,000 students · est. 1801

An Ivy League research university in Manhattan famous for its Core Curriculum — the oldest and most-copied in American higher education.

34,000 students · est. 1754

Chicago's only public research university, famous for health sciences, urban planning and its massive commuter population.

34,000 students · est. 1982

Tennessee's flagship land-grant university, famous for supply chain management, nuclear engineering and the Haslam business college.

34,000 students · est. 1794

Oregon's land-grant research university, famous for forestry, oceanography (hatfield), robotics and nuclear engineering.

34,000 students · est. 1868

The Mountain West's medical and tech hub (the 'Silicon Slopes' pipeline), famous for games (EAE is top-ranked) and medicine.

34,000 students · est. 1850

The LDS church's flagship university, famous for accounting (a perennial top-3 program), language study and its honor code.

34,000 students · est. 1875

Famous for coastal-studies research, petroleum engineering and the Manship School of mass communication.

34,000 students · est. 1860

Alabama's land-grant flagship and an SEC research powerhouse, famous for one of the nation's oldest poultry science programs, Harbert's accounting pipelines and the Toomer's Corner oak tradition.

34,000 students · est. 1856

One of the largest CSU campuses, known for the David Nazarian College of Business, a Cinema and Television Arts program with Hollywood faculty, and a journalism department that anchors the San Fernando Valley's news pipelines.

34,000 students · est. 1958

A top public research university famous for its medical center (the polio vaccine was developed here) and philosophy department.

33,000 students · est. 1787

Kentucky's flagship, famous for medicine (Gill Heart Institute), equine science and the Patterson School of diplomacy.

33,000 students · est. 1865

The nation's oldest public university, famous for journalism (Hussman), business (Kenan-Flagler) and the Research Triangle's medical hub.

32,000 students · est. 1789

The state's flagship public university, famous for the Isenberg School of Management, food science and its pioneering 'U-Learn' programs.

32,000 students · est. 1863

New England's top public university, famous for nursing, ag research, and its hockey-husky culture.

32,000 students · est. 1881

Arkansas's flagship land-grant, famous for the Walton College's top-ranked supply chain program, a thesis-heavy Honors College and SEC athletics.

32,000 students · est. 1871

The largest and most comprehensive SUNY campus and an AAU member, famous for the Jacobs School of Medicine's downtown relocation, big international enrollment and research strength from physics to informatics.

32,000 students · est. 1846

Home of the world's first journalism school (Missouri Method: students run a real NBC affiliate) and a top ag-research campus.

31,000 students · est. 1839

The UNESCO City of Literature campus — home of the Writers' Workshop — plus top medicine and communication studies.

31,000 students · est. 1847

The co-op university: Northeastern alternates classroom semesters with up to three paid six-month co-ops at employers in more than 65 countries, and its acceptance rate fell from about 32% in 2013 to under 7% as applications multiplied.

31,000 students · est. 1898

The young research university built by the founders of Texas Instruments so Dallas could grow its own engineers, now known for the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science, the Naveen Jindal School of Management, and a nationally ranked collegiate esports program in place of a football team.

31,000 students · est. 1969

The capital-region CSU founded in 1947 on the American River, one of the largest campuses in the system, known as California's Capitol internship university, with the orange Guy West Bridge spanning the river as a scale Golden Gate replica and one of the state's largest criminal-justice and business enrollments.

31,000 students · est. 1947

The land-grant that invented the electronic digital computer (Atanasoff–Berry), famous for agriculture, engineering and design.

30,000 students · est. 1858

A Philadelphia public research university famous for the Fox School of Business, a top criminal justice program and Temple University Japan — the oldest and largest US university campus in Japan.

30,000 students · est. 1884

A mountain campus at about 7,000 feet in Flagstaff, famous for its School of Forestry, a hospitality program with resort-industry pipelines and a Lumberjacks identity built on snow, pines and altitude.

30,000 students · est. 1899

A multi-campus public university headquartered in Boca Raton, with Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute on the Treasure Coast, the Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing, and burrowing owls whose protected nests sit inside the campus commons — the owl is the mascot.

30,000 students · est. 1961

North Carolina's urban research university, built from a 1946 night-school center into a 30,000-student campus with the Belk College of Business, the William States Lee College of Engineering, a School of Data Science, and the 49ers name that honors both the gold country and the 1949 fight to stay open.

30,000 students · est. 1946

The second Cal Poly campus, grown from W.K. Kellogg's donated Arabian horse ranch into a 30,000-student polytechnic east of Los Angeles, practicing 'Learn by Doing' across a working farm, the Collins College of Hospitality Management, and one of the West's largest engineering colleges.

30,000 students · est. 1938

An Ogden university founded in 1889 as a Latter-day Saint stake academy and now one of Utah's largest undergraduate-focused campuses, known for the Goddard School's nationally ranked professional sales program, a nursing and health-sciences pipeline for the northern Wasatch Front, and Wildcats basketball royalty in NBA star Damian Lillard.

30,000 students · est. 1889

An R1 research university famous for hospitality (Harrah College is world #1), gaming law and entertainment engineering.

29,000 students · est. 1957

South Carolina's land-grant on Lake Hartwell, famous for Creative Inquiry team research across every college, Packaging Science and one of the loudest stadium entrances in college football.

29,000 students · est. 1889

Kansas's flagship, famous for journalism, pharmacy and the Edwards Campus professional programs.

28,000 students · est. 1865

The Sooner flagship, famous for meteorology (the nation's top program), petroleum engineering and native studies.

28,000 students · est. 1890

Utah's land-grant university in Cache Valley, famous for its Space Dynamics Laboratory, one of the nation's largest collegiate aviation programs and a Quinney College of Natural Resources with its own field stations.

28,000 students · est. 1888

A Richmond research university famous for VCUarts, routinely ranked the nation's top public university arts program, the historic MCV medical campus and a 2011 Final Four run that made the Rams a March Madness legend.

28,000 students · est. 1838

A Greenville pirate university grown from a 1907 teachers training school into one of North Carolina's largest campuses, with the Brody School of Medicine, a nursing college among the state's biggest, and a purple-and-gold game-day culture that fills the town every fall Saturday.

28,000 students · est. 1907

Maryland's biggest producer of new teachers — founded in 1866 as the state's first normal school — now a 28,000-student University System of Maryland campus in Baltimore County with Cook Library's writing center at the core of its composition sequence.

28,000 students · est. 1866

A Hispanic-Serving urban campus famous for founding the nation's first College of Ethnic Studies after the 1968 student strike, its Poetry Center's decades of archived readings and a Cinema department with Bay Area industry ties.

27,000 students · est. 1899

Washington's land-grant university, famous for viticulture & enology (wine science), veterinary medicine and communication.

26,000 students · est. 1890

America's first research university, famous for medicine, public health (the Bloomberg School is world #1) and international studies (SAIS).

26,000 students · est. 1876

Jefferson's Academical Village — a UNESCO World Heritage campus famous for law, commerce, and its student-run honor code.

26,000 students · est. 1819

An Ohio public research university famous for one of the world's top fashion schools, the pioneering liquid crystal research institute and the May 4, 1970 history that reshaped American campuses.

26,000 students · est. 1910

A SUNY flagship beside Brookhaven National Laboratory, famous for marine sciences on Long Island Sound, a heavy health-sciences footprint and one of New York's strongest public engineering programs.

26,000 students · est. 1957

A three-campus public university centered in Statesboro — Statesboro, Savannah and Hinesville — known for the Parker College of Business, a strong water-resources engineering program and one of Georgia's largest alumni networks.

25,500 students · est. 1906

The Ivy League's land-grant university, pairing hotel administration and agriculture with elite engineering and hotel-school rigor.

25,000 students · est. 1865

America's oldest university and the global benchmark for academic prestige, famous for law, medicine, government and business.

25,000 students · est. 1636

Oklahoma's land-grant, famous for agriculture, fire service programs and the Spears School of Business.

25,000 students · est. 1890

West Virginia's flagship land-grant, famous for one of the nation's few accredited forensic science programs, a pioneering online Integrated Marketing Communications master's and Mountaineer traditions.

25,000 students · est. 1867

Colorado's land-grant in Fort Collins, famous for one of the nation's top veterinary medicine programs, atmospheric science's tropical-meteorology legacy and the Warner College of Natural Resources.

25,000 students · est. 1870

The hilltop CSU east of downtown, known for the Charter College of Education, a forensic science program feeding county labs, and the Early Entrance Program that admits full-time students as young as eleven.

24,500 students · est. 1947

Nebraska's flagship land-grant university, famous for ag research, journalism and the Strategic Discussions publishing program.

24,000 students · est. 1869

A colonial-era university famous for chemical engineering (a national top-3), hospitality and marine studies.

24,000 students · est. 1743

Idaho's largest university, famous for its blue Smurf Turf, the Micron School of Materials Science and Engineering, and a nursing program that fills Idaho's hospital pipelines.

24,000 students · est. 1932

A CUNY flagship on Manhattan's Upper East Side, famous for the Hunter-Bellevue nursing pipeline, a social work school with deep city ties and one of the most multilingual student bodies in American higher education.

24,000 students · est. 1870

Norfolk's public research university, famous for TELETECHNET's pioneering satellite courses, maritime and supply-chain programs beside the Port of Virginia and coastal-resilience research in one of America's most flood-exposed cities.

24,000 students · est. 1930

Detroit's public research university, famous for its medical campus next to the Detroit Institute of Arts, the nation's largest labor archives and a social work school with deep city ties.

24,000 students · est. 1868

Philadelphia's co-op university, famous for one of the oldest and largest cooperative-education programs in the country, the Academy of Natural Sciences and a Westphal college that feeds Philly's media scene.

24,000 students · est. 1891

The first university chartered in the Northwest Territory (1804), famous for the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism, a Marching 110 band with a national reputation and a Halloween block party that closes Court Street.

24,000 students · est. 1804

An elite private research university famous for Medill journalism, Kellogg business and the country's premier theater programs.

23,000 students · est. 1851

A metropolitan research university famous for speed engineering, med school and its publish-happy writing center.

23,000 students · est. 1798

New Mexico's flagship, famous for its combined BA/MD pipeline, engineering ties to Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories, and one of the country's oldest Chicana and Chicano Studies programs.

23,000 students · est. 1889

Springfield's public university founded in 1905 as the Fourth District Normal School, now among Missouri's two largest universities, with a distinctive statewide public-affairs mission, the Meyer Library writing center, and business and education programs that anchor the Ozarks.

23,000 students · est. 1905

Mississippi's land-grant university in Starkville, known for the Bagley College of Engineering, a poultry-science program with national reach, the state's only accredited architecture school, and a campus dairy whose student-made cheese is a genuine point of state pride.

23,000 students · est. 1878

A Virginia public university of about 22,000 students famous for a dedicated Writing, Rhetoric and Technical Communication department, a business school with strong placement and a nursing program feeding the Shenandoah Valley's hospitals.

22,200 students · est. 1908

Oregon's flagship, famous for journalism (the school behind Nike's founder), architecture and human physiology.

22,000 students · est. 1876

An urban research university famous for its medical center — one of the largest academic hospital complexes in America.

22,000 students · est. 1969

Mississippi's flagship, famous for the Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College, the Center for the Study of Southern Culture and a top-10 undergraduate accountancy program.

22,000 students · est. 1844

New Jersey's second-largest university, famous for its film and communication programs, the Yogi Berra Museum on campus and a red-hawk identity in one of the most diverse student bodies in the state.

22,000 students · est. 1908

A private research university famous for the Newhouse communications school, one of the oldest US architecture programs and a Dome that anchors both football and lacrosse traditions.

22,000 students · est. 1870

A Michigan public of about 22,000 founded in 1960, split between the Allendale farmland campus and a growing Grand Rapids downtown footprint, with four Division II football championships and a large nursing program.

22,000 students · est. 1960

The flagship public university of Memphis, home to a top-ranked criminology program, the Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law on the Mississippi riverfront, and the FedEx Institute of Technology.

22,000 students · est. 1912

A large public university in Huntsville, Texas, commonly cited as the third-oldest public institution of higher learning in the state, known for its nationally recognized College of Criminal Justice and for Bearkats teams now competing in Conference USA.

22,000 students · est. 1879

A public university founded in 1809 with a composition program so established that the state's other campuses model theirs on it, and a Farmer School of Business that ranks among the top undergraduate business schools.

21,500 students · est. 1809

A UNC-system university of about 21,500 students in the Blue Ridge town of Boone, famous for the Walker College of Business (the state's largest undergraduate business school), sustainability programs and Mountaineer football.

21,500 students · est. 1899

Nevada's historic flagship, famous for its medical school, seismology lab and Reynolds School of Journalism.

21,000 students · est. 1874

A 'Learn by Doing' CSU campus with some of the nation's most selective admissions outside the UCs, famous for its five-year architecture program, hands-on engineering labs and student-built structures in Poly Canyon.

21,000 students · est. 1901

The largest Catholic university in the United States, famous for its Vincentian service mission, Loop-campus towers that put internships a subway stop away and a College of Computing and Digital Media that treats Chicago as a lab.

21,000 students · est. 1898

An urban research university in downtown Portland living its 'Let Knowledge Serve the City' motto, famous for University Studies' required community-based capstones, planning and sustainability programs and a campus threaded into the transit grid.

21,000 students · est. 1946

Illinois' first public university, founded in 1857 as a normal school to train teachers, now a campus of about 21,000 with one of the largest education programs and a nationally known insurance and risk-management school.

21,000 students · est. 1857

The first operational land-grant university, famous for agriculture, veterinary medicine and grain science.

20,000 students · est. 1863

A nursing-only university whose 3-year BSN and concept-map assignments make it the reference campus for nursing paper formats.

20,000 students · est. 1889

One of America's first distance-learning universities, pioneer of credit-by-exam and a nursing school whose distance BSN shaped the genre.

20,000 students · est. 1971

The world's largest Baptist university, famous for a perennially top-ranked professional selling program, Truett Seminary and a pre-med pipeline feeding Texas medical schools.

20,000 students · est. 1845

A Muncie public university famous for immersive-learning teams producing real client deliverables, an undergraduate architecture program and the telecommunications school that launched David Letterman.

20,000 students · est. 1918

Tennessee's largest undergraduate university, famous for a Recording Industry department that feeds Nashville's music business, a major collegiate aerospace program and True Blue Patriot spirit.

20,000 students · est. 1911

The largest university in Pennsylvania's State System, founded in 1871 as a normal school in the Brandywine Valley west of Philadelphia, now known for big business and nursing programs, one of the state's largest teacher pipelines, and the Golden Rams marching band tradition.

20,000 students · est. 1871

The City University of New York's business college, grown from City College's 1919 school of business and named for financier Bernard Baruch, with the Zicklin School among the largest accredited business schools in the country, a 17-story vertical campus in the Flatiron district, and a student body that speaks more than a hundred languages.

20,000 students · est. 1919

An Inland Empire CSU at the foot of the San Bernardino Mountains, founded in 1965, known for criminal justice, cyber and business programs serving one of the fastest-growing regions in California, a Palm Desert branch campus, and a student union named for Santos Manuel of the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians.

20,000 students · est. 1965

A private research university famous for its medical school, marine science programs and Atlantic hurricane research.

19,000 students · est. 1925

A Cajun-country research campus that reached R1 status in 2022, famous for its informatics and computing work, Ragin' Cajuns athletics and deep Louisiana-culture archives.

19,000 students · est. 1898

The Glassboro school renamed for Henry Rowan after his $100 million gift in 1992 — the largest ever to a public college at the time — now New Jersey's second designated research university, with its own medical schools in Camden and Stratford and an engineering college built from that gift.

19,000 students · est. 1923

The northwest Ohio normal school grown into a 19,000-student university, home of the department that founded popular-culture studies, a CCHA power in Falcon hockey, and an aviation program whose flight logs shape a distinctive technical-writing load.

19,000 students · est. 1910

A UNC System campus founded in 1891 as a women's college, coeducational since 1963, known for education, nursing and music programs and the bronze Minerva statue that anchors the quad.

18,700 students · est. 1891

One of the four SUNY university centers, Binghamton grew from a 1946 college for returning World War II veterans into a research campus of about 18,000 with strength in nursing, engineering and accounting, and rankings guides routinely place it among the top 50 public universities.

18,100 students · est. 1946

The flagship of the University of Hawaii system, famous for oceanography and astronomy (SOEST), Shidler's international business programs and deep Pacific and Asian studies collections.

18,000 students · est. 1907

A UNC-system campus of about 18,000 on the Cape Fear coast, known for marine science at its Center for Marine Science and a film-studies program tied to Wilmington's Screen Gems studios, the core of the Hollywood East nickname.

18,000 students · est. 1947

A mill-city research campus on the Merrimack River in the town where Jack Kerouac was born, grown from the 1894 Lowell Textile School into a full UMass research university with the Francis College of Engineering and the Zuckerberg College of Health Sciences as its engines.

18,000 students · est. 1894

A public research university spanning both banks of the Merrimack River in Lowell, Massachusetts, known for engineering, music and sound recording technology programs, roots in two nineteenth-century teaching institutions, and River Hawks teams in the America East and Hockey East.

18,000 students · est. 1894

Wisconsin's second-largest public campus and an R1 research university, famous for a film program with a national reputation and a School of Freshwater Sciences that sits directly on the Lake Michigan shore.

17,500 students · est. 1956

An elite private university famous for medicine, law, public policy and the Thompson Writing Program's seminar model.

17,000 students · est. 1838

A leading land-grant for Yellowstone research, famous for snow science, optics and photography (a famous film school tradition).

17,000 students · est. 1893

Rhode Island's flagship public research university, famous for its Graduate School of Oceanography on Narragansett Bay, the state's only College of Pharmacy and a historic textiles program.

17,000 students · est. 1892

The largest Jesuit university in the United States, famous for a Lake Shore Campus on the Lake Michigan shore, the John Felice Rome Center and health-sciences programs anchored at the Maywood medical campus.

17,000 students · est. 1870

Kansas's urban research university in the self-declared Air Capital of the World, famous for the National Institute for Aviation Research's full-scale airframe testing, the wheat-shocking Shockers and an Innovation Campus built on a former golf course.

17,000 students · est. 1895

A hilltop campus famous for a photojournalism program whose alumni have won multiple Pulitzers, Big Red the mascot and one of the most decorated forensics programs in the country.

17,000 students · est. 1906

A Kalamazoo public founded in 1903, known for its College of Aviation at the W.K. Kellogg Airport, one of the country's only paper-engineering programs, and its place at the center of the tuition-changing Kalamazoo Promise.

17,000 students · est. 1903

A heavily wooded campus in Jacksonville's Southside carved from 1,300 acres of pine flatwoods and wetlands, opened in 1972 as an upper-division school before welcoming freshmen in 1984, known for AACSB-accredited business programs, a nature-trail network through the Sawmill Slough preserve, and Ospreys athletics named for the raptors that nest along the St. Johns River.

17,000 students · est. 1969

A Beaumont public university named for Republic of Texas president Mirabeau B. Lamar, known for its Spindletop oil-boom museum, a Gulf Coast engineering and nursing pipeline, and Cardinals athletics.

17,000 students · est. 1923

Louisiana's second-largest university, a public R2 campus in the heart of Cajun country, known for petroleum engineering, nursing and computer science programs, the Ragin' Cajuns of the Sun Belt Conference, and a campus bisected by the Vermilion River.

17,000 students · est. 1898

A large Minnesota State system campus born as an 1868 normal school, famous for its aviation program, Mavericks hockey and one of the region's biggest education colleges.

16,500 students · est. 1868

A private research university famous for biomedical engineering, nursing and its joint programs with the Cleveland Clinic.

16,000 students · est. 1826

A Michigan public of about 16,000 built on Matilda Dodge Wilson's donated Meadow Brook estate, where nursing, business and engineering students study a short walk from the 110-room Meadow Brook Hall mansion.

16,000 students · est. 1957

The DeKalb public university with an accountancy program that feeds the Chicago Big Four offices, a College of Law, and a campus built around the state's most recognizable castle building.

16,000 students · est. 1895

Nebraska's metropolitan university — Omaha University from 1908, folded into the state system in 1968 — with the College of Information Science and Technology, the Scott Campus's Peter Kiewit Institute, and a commuter-campus culture in the state's largest city.

16,000 students · est. 1908

Boston's only public research university, built in 1964 on Columbia Point with the JFK Presidential Library and the Edward M. Kennedy Institute as neighbors, known for a commuter-majority student body, strong urban and environmental research off the harbor, and the McCormack graduate schools of policy.

16,000 students · est. 1964

The oldest Catholic university in the Northeast, chartered in 1841 as St. John's College, with a Rose Hill campus in the Bronx and a Manhattan campus at Lincoln Center that feed internships in media, finance and law.

15,800 students · est. 1841

An elite private university famous for medicine, the Olin Business School and social-work (Brown School) programs.

15,000 students · est. 1853

Famous for ocean engineering (the Shoals Laboratory), hospitality management and space science.

15,000 students · est. 1866

The Glass City's public university, founded in 1872 through Jesup W. Scott's land gift, known for a mandatory engineering co-op program, a College of Medicine and Life Sciences from the 2006 Medical College of Ohio merger, and the Glass Bowl stadium on the Ottawa River.

15,000 students · est. 1872

The country's flagship college of criminal justice, opened in 1964 to educate New York's police and fire officers and renamed for the first Chief Justice, known for a heavily applied forensic-science program, fire-science and emergency-management majors few colleges offer, and a Hell's Kitchen campus that doubles as a public-safety research hub.

15,000 students · est. 1964

A San Francisco Bay CSU perched on the Hayward hills, founded in 1957 as Alameda County's state college, known for first-generation and commuter-student success, business and nursing pipelines into the East Bay, and a campus the Hayward Fault crosses in open sight.

15,000 students · est. 1957

The newest campus of the University of Missouri System, a major commuter institution in north St. Louis County known for a nationally ranked criminology program, the St. Louis Mercantile Library, and Tritons athletics in Division II.

15,000 students · est. 1963

A public university on a hilltop in Highland Heights, Kentucky, about ten miles from downtown Cincinnati, known for Chase College of Law, an early-moving College of Informatics, and Norse teams in the Horizon League.

15,000 students · est. 1968

Alaska's largest university, a public campus anchoring the Anchorage University-Medical District, known for nursing, engineering and business programs that feed the state's workforce, and Seawolves teams in the GNAC.

15,000 students · est. 1954

A downtown Cleveland public university built from Fenn College in 1964, known for the Levin College of Urban Affairs, an engaged-learning requirement rare at this scale, and pipelines into the city's hospitals, courts and engineering firms.

14,800 students · est. 1964

A Mount Pleasant public university founded as a normal school in 1892, now known for one of the largest off-campus and online programs in the Midwest and an undergraduate neuroscience major that remains rare nationally.

14,700 students · est. 1892

The Bellingham public university between the Cascades and the Salish Sea, known for environmental science and policy, a top design program, and an outdoor culture that treats the Chuckanut Mountains as the back quad.

14,700 students · est. 1893

An Ivy famous for law, drama, and its residential-college system — plus the world's most selective writing-heavy admissions.

14,000 students · est. 1701

A private research university famous for public health (a top tropical-medicine school), architecture and the required public-service capstone.

14,000 students · est. 1834

A public Ivy famous for environmental programs, the Rubenstein School, and medical-laboratory science.

14,000 students · est. 1791

The Baltimore-area research campus famous for the Meyerhoff Scholars program that rewired how America trains underrepresented STEM graduates, plus national rankings in information systems and chess.

14,000 students · est. 1966

Mississippi's second-largest public university, famous for a top polymer science program, the de Grummond children's literature archive and campuses stretching from Hattiesburg to the Gulf Coast.

14,000 students · est. 1910

A public university of about 14,000 students created by the Alabama legislature in 1963, famous for running its own teaching hospitals and a College of Medicine that anchors Mobile's health-care economy.

14,000 students · est. 1963

The Ypsilanti public university founded in 1849 as Michigan's first teacher-training school west of the Alleghenies, now a major producer of educators, nurses and cybersecurity graduates.

14,000 students · est. 1849

The Dakotas' oldest university — founded in 1883, six years before North Dakota statehood — with the Odegard School of Aerospace Sciences among the world's largest university aviation programs, the state's only medical school, and a college hockey powerhouse at Ralph Engelstad Arena.

14,000 students · est. 1883

New Mexico's land-grant university in the Rio Grande valley at Las Cruces, home of the Chile Pepper Institute, a NASA space-grant research campus, and agricultural programs that breed the state's signature crop.

14,000 students · est. 1888

The largest university in northeast Arkansas, chartered in 1909 as the First District Agricultural School and now the state's second-largest campus, with the Neil Griffin College of Business, a Heritage Studies doctorate, and a Red Wolves football culture that fills Jonesboro every fall.

14,000 students · est. 1909

The Argonaut university of the Panhandle, chartered in 1963 on a 1,600-acre wooded tract west of Pensacola, with a marine-biology footprint on the Gulf, an archaeology program that digs the city's colonial past, and one of Florida's largest nursing pipelines.

14,000 students · est. 1963

The largest HBCU in the United States, an 1891 land-grant in Greensboro whose four freshmen launched the 1960 Woolworth sit-in movement, with an engineering college among the nation's top producers of Black engineers and an Aggie homecoming billed as the Greatest Homecoming on Earth.

14,000 students · est. 1891

An elite private university famous for medicine, education (Peabody), and the Blair School of Music.

13,000 students · est. 1873

The Rocky Mountain region's oldest private research university, famous for the Josef Korbel School of International Studies, a Pioneer hockey dynasty and a 1864 charter that predates Colorado statehood.

13,000 students · est. 1864

The nation's most famous Catholic research university, famous for its classical School of Architecture, Mendoza's finance programs and a football independent status backed by an exclusive NBC contract.

13,000 students · est. 1842

The 1837 academy on the Ohio River that became one of West Virginia's two research universities, known for the Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine, the W. Page Pitt journalism school, and a football legacy rebuilt after the 1970 crash that the film We Are Marshall carried worldwide.

13,000 students · est. 1837

Oklahoma's oldest public institution of higher learning, a normal-school-turned-regional university in Edmond known for the Old North tower, a nationally visible jazz studies program, and Bronchos teams in the MIAA.

13,000 students · est. 1890

A private university of about 12,500 students historically tied to the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), famous for the Neeley School of Business, the Bob Schieffer College of Communication and a purple-drenched game-day culture.

12,500 students · est. 1873

North Dakota's land-grant, famous for hard red spring wheat breeding, a nationally known polymers and coatings program, and a Bison football dynasty.

12,000 students · est. 1890

Maine's flagship land-grant on the Stillwater River, famous for the Advanced Structures and Composites Center's record-setting 3D printers, one of America's oldest forestry programs and the state's New Media program.

12,000 students · est. 1865

A Dallas private university founded by Methodists in 1911, famous for the Cox School of Business, the Meadows School of the Arts and a George W. Bush Presidential Center built directly on campus.

12,000 students · est. 1911

Newark's public STEM research university, founded in 1881 as the Newark Technical School, with the Hillier architecture college, the Ying Wu computing college, Newark College of Engineering, and one of the country's largest engineering co-op programs in the University Heights district.

12,000 students · est. 1881

A central-Washington campus founded in 1891 as the state normal school at Ellensburg, known for education and aviation programs, the chimpanzee sign-language research legacy of Washoe and Roger Fouts, and a Kittitas Valley setting locals call the geographic center of the state.

12,000 students · est. 1891

One of the largest UW comprehensives, grown from an 1868 normal school in a small prairie town between Madison and Milwaukee, known for an AACSB-accredited business college whose accounting majors post some of Wisconsin's best CPA pass rates, a six-time Division III football dynasty, and a pioneering wheelchair basketball program.

12,000 students · est. 1868

A normal school founded in 1871 that grew into Warrensburg's comprehensive university, known for education and business programs that anchor west-central Missouri, the Missouri Innovation Campus's accelerated dual-credit model, and Mules and Jennies teams that give athletics one of college sports' rare split nicknames.

12,000 students · est. 1871

The westernmost campus in the UNC System, set in the Tuckaseigee River valley below the Blue Ridge escarpment, known for Catamounts football in the Southern Conference and its Mountain Heritage Center.

12,000 students · est. 1889

Idaho's health-sciences campus in Pocatello, with pharmacy, nursing and allied-health programs that serve as a statewide pipeline, plus engineering and research ties to the Idaho National Laboratory.

12,000 students · est. 1901

Idaho's flagship and land-grant university, chartered by the territorial legislature in 1889 months before statehood, with top-ranked natural resources programs and the barrel-roofed Kibbie Dome.

11,800 students · est. 1889

Wyoming's only four-year public university, famous for energy engineering, rangeland ecology and the Synergy writing-research program.

11,000 students · est. 1886

The Ivy with the open curriculum (no core requirements) and a writing-culture that grades narrative evaluations in many courses.

11,000 students · est. 1764

South Dakota's land-grant and largest university, famous for dairy manufacturing (with a working campus plant), agricultural research and a long-running online GIS master's degree.

11,000 students · est. 1881

A Jesuit university in Milwaukee famous for direct-admission nursing, Wisconsin's only dental school and the Diederich College of Communication.

11,000 students · est. 1881

A Marianist university of about 11,000 known for engineering, education and business, its packed student neighborhood of shared houses, and an arena that has hosted the NCAA First Four since 2001.

11,000 students · est. 1850

The piney-woods engineering university on the I-20 corridor in Ruston, chartered in 1894 as the Industrial Institute of Louisiana, known for a College of Engineering and Science that launched the nation's first nanosystems engineering degree, and for the Lady Techsters basketball dynasty that won the first NCAA women's title.

11,000 students · est. 1894

The Mocs of downtown Chattanooga, founded in 1886 as Chattanooga University and folded into the UT system in 1969, known for an engineering SimCenter with national computational-modeling reach, a riverfront campus ringed by Civil War ridgelines, and a Mockingbird mascot named Scrappy.

11,000 students · est. 1886

The Bulldogs' hilltop campus above Lake Superior, grown from an 1895 normal school into the U of M system's Duluth branch, with a Swenson College of Science and Engineering, the Labovitz School of Business, Tweed Museum galleries, and a hockey program with three national titles.

11,000 students · est. 1895

A Chippewa River campus grown from a 1916 normal school into one of Wisconsin's most-attended regional universities, known for a nationally celebrated jazz program, large education and nursing pipelines, and Blugold pride that empties campus toward the river on fall Fridays.

11,000 students · est. 1916

A University System of Georgia campus in the state's deep-south azalea country, chartered in 1906 as a normal school for women, known for one of the nation's largest communication sciences and disorders programs, a big nursing pipeline into south Georgia hospitals, and the Blazers' intense fan culture.

11,000 students · est. 1906

A public university in Cedar City at the gateway to Utah's national parks, known for the Tony-winning Utah Shakespeare Festival it hosts, a growing aviation program, and Thunderbirds teams in the Big Sky Conference.

11,000 students · est. 1897

A Conway public of about 10,500 that grew out of a 1954 College of Charleston branch, famous for its 2016 College World Series baseball title and a musical theatre program with Broadway results.

10,500 students · est. 1954

The Rocket City's university, founded as an extension center in 1950 and grown by the space program, with engineering and nursing as the twin engines and a research park stitched into Cummings Research Park.

10,200 students · est. 1950

Famous for environmental writing, forestry and the Daihyo-cha-rts wildlife biology program.

10,000 students · est. 1893

An Orange, California private university of about 10,000 students famous for the Dodge College of Film and Media Arts, one of the top undergraduate film programs in the country, and a growing health-science presence in nearby Irvine.

10,000 students · est. 1861

The oldest college in the South, founded in 1770 in colonial Charleston, now a public liberal-arts university scattered through the city's antebellum streets, with a marine-biology lab on the harbor, an Avery Research Center documenting African American history, and commencement held under the live oaks at the Cistern.

10,000 students · est. 1770

The 1909 normal school wedged between Grandad Bluff and the Mississippi, now the UW System's exercise-science powerhouse with one of the largest undergraduate kinesiology programs in the country, the Mississippi Valley Archaeology Center, and a campus trail network that starts at the residence halls.

10,000 students · est. 1909

The Coyote flagship chartered in 1862, two decades before South Dakota statehood, holding both the state's only law school and its only medical school, plus the National Music Museum's world-class instrument collection in a former Carnegie library on the Vermillion campus.

10,000 students · est. 1862

The only CSU campus in the southern San Joaquin Valley, founded in 1965 to serve Kern County's oil-and-agriculture corridor, known for a nursing program that staffs Central Valley hospitals, geology field courses that run straight into the surrounding oil fields, and a commuter-friendly campus on Bakersfield's east side.

10,000 students · est. 1965

The Upper Cumberland's flagship, founded in 1915 as Tennessee Polytechnic Institute, known for engineering and AACSB-accredited business programs that staff the Highland Rim's schools, clinics and plants, the Millard Oakley STEM Center's outreach across the region, and a residential campus halfway between Nashville and Knoxville.

10,000 students · est. 1915

A regional university founded in 1882 as a private academy in Cheney, twenty minutes southwest of Spokane, known for health-sciences programs anchored at its Spokane campus, the scarlet Inferno turf at Roos Field, and an Eagles football culture that plays on one of the most distinctive surfaces in American college sports.

10,000 students · est. 1882

A Dayton-area public university named for the Wright brothers, built beside the Huffman Prairie Flying Field where the pair perfected powered flight, and known for its tunnel-linked campus and Boonshoft School of Medicine.

10,000 students · est. 1964

Connecticut's oldest publicly supported institution of higher education, a New Britain normal school turned comprehensive university known for its public planetarium, engineering programs, and Blue Devils athletics.

10,000 students · est. 1849

Colorado's historic teacher-training school in Greeley, now a comprehensive public university known for its education college, the Baldrige Award-winning Monfort College of Business, and Bears athletics in the Big Sky Conference.

10,000 students · est. 1889

A New Jersey Catholic university founded in 1856, famous for its School of Diplomacy and International Relations with United Nations connections, the Stillman School of Business and a nursing pipeline into New York hospitals.

9,700 students · est. 1856

The private university in West Haven, Connecticut, famous for the Henry C. Lee College of Criminal Justice and Forensic Sciences, one of the country's largest fire-science programs, and steady pipelines into Connecticut and New York agencies.

9,700 students · est. 1920

San Francisco's first university, founded by Jesuits in 1855, famous for Bill Russell's back-to-back NCAA basketball titles in 1955 and 1956 and the undefeated 1951 football team that refused to leave its Black teammates home from a bowl game.

9,600 students · est. 1855

A Jesuit university famous for health-sciences pipelines into Omaha's hospital system, the Heider College of Business and a School of Medicine that now trains a full class in Phoenix.

9,300 students · est. 1878

The second-oldest college in the United States, chartered by King William III and Queen Mary II in 1693, whose alumni include Jefferson, Monroe and Tyler and whose 37 percent admit rate now rivals the Ivy-adjacent publics.

9,200 students · est. 1693

Minnesota's largest private university, a Catholic school founded by an archbishop in 1885, known for the Opus College of Business, a Division I transition completed in 2021, and a summit-avenue campus of brick mansions.

9,100 students · est. 1885

The undergraduate-focused Ivy famous for the required junior paper (JP) and senior thesis — every student does original research twice.

9,000 students · est. 1746

Iowa's teachers college turned comprehensive university, famous for one of the Midwest's largest education pipelines, a decorated School of Music and a panther mascot named TC.

9,000 students · est. 1876

The university behind the Quinnipiac Poll, famous for health-sciences and nursing programs, a Bobcats hockey following and media-production facilities in Connecticut's shadow of Sleeping Giant mountain.

9,000 students · est. 1929

California's oldest operating private university, founded in 1851 on the site of Mission Santa Clara de Asis, famous for the Leavey School of Business, engineering programs and the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics.

9,000 students · est. 1851

Baltimore's public urban research university and one of Maryland's two Carnegie R2 HBCUs, begun in 1867 as the Centenary Biblical Institute, now known for a School of Engineering among the top producers of Black engineers in the country and a School of Global Journalism and Communication on the Hillen Road campus.

9,000 students · est. 1867

The University of Massachusetts' South Coast campus, born of the region's textile schools and assembled under one charter in 1991, known for a Paul Rudolph-designed brutalist campus, a leading center of Portuguese studies in the heart of the New England whaling diaspora, and engineering and nursing programs serving the New Bedford-Fall River corridor.

9,000 students · est. 1895

Rhode Island's oldest public institution of higher education, founded in 1854 as a normal school decades before URI, known as the state's biggest teacher-education pipeline, with a Providence campus in the Mount Pleasant neighborhood and a commuter-friendly culture that carries working students through nursing, social work and business degrees.

9,000 students · est. 1854

The University of Michigan's Metro Detroit campus, created in 1959 on Henry Ford's donated Fair Lane estate, known for engineering and business programs wired into the automotive corridor, a Rouge River wetland interpretive center, and one of the country's most internationally diverse student bodies.

9,000 students · est. 1959

A PASSHE campus in rolling farmland north of Pittsburgh, founded in 1889 as a state normal school, known as one of Pennsylvania's biggest teacher-education pipelines, home to nationally known adapted physical activity programs, and the neighbor of a relict prairie ecosystem unique in the state.

9,000 students · est. 1889

A Kentucky regional in the Jackson Purchase near Kentucky Lake, founded in 1922 as a normal school, known for a teacher-education and nursing core, one of the state's largest agriculture programs, basketball glory that includes Ja Morant's 2019 NCAA upset run, and a steady run of Fulbright honorees.

9,000 students · est. 1922

The largest of Connecticut's four state universities, founded in 1893 as the New Haven State Normal School, known for teacher-preparation programs that feed the state's classrooms, a hilltop campus backing up to West Rock Ridge, and graduate programs that draw working professionals from the whole shoreline corridor.

9,000 students · est. 1893

A Purdue System regional university formed in 2016 from the Calumet and North Central campuses, serving Northwest Indiana's steel and logistics corridor from sites in Hammond and Westville, with nursing, engineering and cybersecurity pipelines that feed employers on both sides of the Illinois line.

9,000 students · est. 2016

A prairie normal school founded in 1905 that is now the University of Nebraska system's residential campus on the Platte River valley, known for teacher education and business degrees serving the central Great Plains, the Museum of Nebraska Art's statewide collection in downtown Kearney, and Lopers teams carrying one of college sports' most unusual nicknames.

9,000 students · est. 1905

A Bayou State regional university founded in 1931 as Ouachita Parish Junior College and grown through the Northeast Louisiana years, known as the home of Louisiana's only publicly supported college of pharmacy, a nursing and kinesiology pipeline for northeast Louisiana, and Warhawks athletics rebranded in 2006 with a name honoring the P-40 fighters of the Flying Tigers.

9,000 students · est. 1931

A public HBCU founded in 1877 as a Natchez seminary for the education of newly freed African Americans and now Mississippi's largest HBCU in the capital city, known for the Sonic Boom of the South marching band and the Prancing J-Settes, a criminal justice and public health research footprint, and an alumni roster that runs from Walter Payton to generations of civil rights era leaders.

9,000 students · est. 1877

A public university founded in 1969 and named for Richard Stockton, a New Jersey signer of the Declaration of Independence, set on a forested campus inside the Pine Barrens about ten miles from Atlantic City, known for environmental science and coastal fieldwork, a Boardwalk extension campus opened in 2018, and small-seminar teaching built for first-year students.

9,000 students · est. 1969

The capital-city campus of the University of Arkansas System, known for its Sequoyah National Research Center, applied programs in criminal justice and social work, and Trojans teams now in the Ohio Valley Conference.

9,000 students · est. 1927

A private Christian university beside Nashville's Music Row, known for the Mike Curb College of Entertainment and Music Business, strong nursing and business programs, and Bruins teams now playing in the Missouri Valley Conference.

9,000 students · est. 1890

A Hoboken engineering institute founded in 1870, famous as the first college in America dedicated to mechanical engineering, perched on Castle Point directly across the Hudson River from Manhattan.

8,800 students · est. 1870

A lakeside SUNY campus on the Lake Ontario shore, founded in 1861 as the Oswego Normal School whose Pestalozzian 'Oswego Movement' reshaped teacher training worldwide, now known for one of the country's few undergraduate-only meteorology programs, a broadcast-heavy communication department, and lake-effect snow measured in feet.

8,000 students · est. 1861

Wisconsin's designated polytechnic university, founded in 1891 from lumber baron James Huff Stout's manual-training school, known for a nationally ranked game-design degree, one of the country's few packaging programs, and hotel, construction and dietetics labs that put Learn-by-doing to work in Menomonie.

8,000 students · est. 1891

A small CSU campus in Sonoma County wine country between Santa Rosa and the North Bay, founded in 1960, known for the Green Music Center's concert hall built after Tanglewood's Seiji Ozawa Hall, the nation's first wine-business program, and a heavily residential campus ringed by vineyards below Sonoma Mountain.

8,000 students · est. 1960

New Jersey's first state normal school, founded in 1855 and now one of the most selective public colleges in the state, known for a residential campus in Ewing near Trenton, a First Seminar that puts every freshman in a small writing-intensive class, and the Sarnoff Collection's archive of RCA broadcasting history.

8,000 students · est. 1855

A public university on the Embarras River prairie in Charleston, Illinois, known for its teacher-training roots, its Gothic Revival Old Main, and a quarterback lineage that produced Tony Romo and Jimmy Garoppolo.

8,000 students · est. 1895

A Spiritan Catholic university on a bluff above Pittsburgh's Monongahela River, known for nursing, pharmacy and business programs, its founding by the Congregation of the Holy Ghost, and Dukes teams in the Atlantic 10.

8,000 students · est. 1878

A public engineering college founded to supply Colorado's mining industry, famous for top-ranked petroleum and geological engineering programs and one of the strongest placement records in engineering education.

7,400 students · est. 1874

A Jesuit university of about 7,300 students in Spokane, famous for Bulldogs basketball's two national title game appearances, a nursing school with regional clinical ties and a business program loaded with Seattle and Portland recruiters.

7,300 students · est. 1887

A Jesuit university of about 7,200 students on Capitol Hill, famous for the Albers School of Business, a nursing program wired into Seattle's hospital network and the Steven Holl-designed Chapel of St. Ignatius.

7,200 students · est. 1891

A Jesuit university on the Connecticut shore whose admit rate has collapsed from over 50 percent to the low twenties in five years, driven by the Marion Peckham Egan nursing school and the Charles F. Dolan business school.

7,200 students · est. 1942

The Ivy focused on undergraduate teaching, famous for the Tuck business school, Geisel medicine and its D-Plan quarter system.

7,000 students · est. 1769

Alaska's flagship research campus and a global center for Arctic science, famous for its Geophysical Institute, Alaska Native Studies and distance programs that reach villages across the state.

7,000 students · est. 1917

A University System of Maryland campus on the Delmarva peninsula, known for the Perdue School of Business, a nursing program feeding Eastern Shore hospitals, and the Ward Museum of Wildfowl Art on its edge.

7,000 students · est. 1925

The Keweenaw Peninsula's mining school turned engineering research university, perched on the shore of Lake Superior in Houghton, known for its Winter Carnival snow-statue tradition, a student-run Enterprise Program of real companies, and engineering outcomes that punch far above the town's size.

7,000 students · est. 1885

The original University of Missouri School of Mines in Rolla, an 1870 land-grant that grew into one of the nation's most engineering-saturated campuses, known for its half-scale granite Stonehenge, Solar Decathlon-winning houses students live in, and a St. Patrick's celebration that treats the patron saint of engineers like homecoming royalty.

7,000 students · est. 1870

The SUNY teachers college in the apple country between Syracuse and Ithaca, famous for one of the nation's oldest and largest physical-education programs, a Red Dragons athletic culture that dominates SUNYAC play, and an outdoor-education branch campus on Raquette Lake in the Adirondacks.

7,000 students · est. 1868

Georgia's designated public liberal-arts university, founded in 1889 in Milledgeville, the state's antebellum capital, known for a residential honors-style culture, the Old Governor's Mansion on its historic quadrangle, and the Flannery O'Connor Andalusia farm connection that anchors its writing reputation.

7,000 students · est. 1889

A Mississippi River island-city campus founded in 1858 as the first normal school west of the Mississippi, known for education and nursing pipelines into the Driftless Region, a geoscience program that reads the river bluffs as a field lab, and a small-town arts calendar anchored by the Minnesota Marine Art Museum.

7,000 students · est. 1858

The youngest campus in the CSU system, opened in 2002 on the renovated grounds of the former Camarillo State Hospital, known for Spanish Colonial Revival buildings turned classrooms, a research station on Santa Rosa Island, and small-cohort programs serving Ventura County.

7,000 students · est. 2002

A young Michigan public founded in 1963 as a private college and folded into the state system in 1987, set in University Center between Saginaw and Bay City, known for nursing programs with some of Michigan's strongest NCLEX pass rates, hands-on undergraduate engineering, and the Marshall M. Fredericks Sculpture Museum on campus.

7,000 students · est. 1963

The Upper Peninsula's largest university, founded in 1899 as a normal school on the Lake Superior shore in Marquette, known for the Superior Dome's record-setting wooden roof, the long-running U.S. Olympic Education Center that trained winter-sport hopefuls on campus, and outdoor programs that treat the lake and pine forests as a laboratory.

7,000 students · est. 1899

A Pennsylvania State System campus founded in 1866 as the Keystone State Normal School, known for education, business and communication-design programs in the Berks County countryside, the Pennsylvania German Cultural Heritage Center's preservation of the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect, and an NFL pipeline that runs from campus through Hall of Fame receiver Andre Reed.

7,000 students · est. 1866

California's oldest chartered university, a private campus on the Stockton channel known for its Conservatory of Music, Dave Brubeck's alma mater, and dental, law and pharmacy programs spread across three cities.

7,000 students · est. 1851

A private university in the North Carolina Piedmont known for oak-lined walks, a nationally top-ranked study-abroad program, the Love School of Business and School of Communications, and Phoenix teams in the Coastal Athletic Association.

7,000 students · est. 1889

A Hudson Valley college of about 5,100 undergraduates famous for the Marist Poll, whose national surveys run in partnership with NBC News, and for fashion and communications programs with New York internship pipelines.

6,700 students · est. 1929

The Hudson Valley campus in Poughkeepsie whose Marist Institute for Public Opinion runs one of the country's most-cited college polls, paired with a communication school that feeds New York media pipelines.

6,700 students · est. 1929

A private university with deep energy-industry roots, famous for top petroleum engineering and geosciences programs, a strong creative writing tradition and Tulsa's art deco oil-capital setting.

6,500 students · est. 1894

California's first chartered university (1851), a Stockton private campus of about 6,400 with the Conservatory of Music, the Thomas J. Long School of Pharmacy and accelerated health-science pathways.

6,400 students · est. 1851

A Christian university that began as a 1899 Bible training school in Whittier and moved to Azusa in 1949, known for its large School of Nursing and Division II PacWest athletics.

6,300 students · est. 1899

Delaware's 1890 land-grant HBCU, famous for its agriculture and aviation programs, the only optometry pipeline at an HBCU and a Capitol-adjacent Dover campus that feeds state government internships.

6,200 students · est. 1891

A Churches of Christ university in Abilene, Texas, founded in 1906 as Childers Classical Institute, known for its nursing and business programs and a 2008 iPhone rollout that made national tech news.

6,000 students · est. 1906

A private university built from three respected schools — the Hartt School of Music, the Hartford Art School and Hillyer College — on a 350-acre campus bordering Elizabeth Park, with unusual strength where arts and engineering share parking lots.

6,000 students · est. 1957

A University of North Carolina System HBCU founded in 1892 as Slater Industrial Academy in the twin city of Winston-Salem, known for nursing and health-sciences pipelines into the region's hospital systems, the Red Sea of Sound marching band, and a Rams homecoming that fills the city each fall.

6,000 students · est. 1892

Maryland's oldest public HBCU, begun in 1865 as the Baltimore Normal School for Colored Teachers and relocated to Bowie in 1914, known for teacher education, nursing and cybersecurity programs on a campus halfway between Baltimore and Washington, and a Bulldogs culture that draws commuters from both cities.

6,000 students · est. 1865

A SUNY campus on the Lake Champlain shore an hour from the Canadian border, founded in 1889 as a normal school and among the original campuses when SUNY was chartered, known for teacher education, environmental field work across the Champlain Valley, and a student body that treats Montreal as its big-city annex.

6,000 students · est. 1889

New Jersey's designated public liberal arts college, founded in 1969 as the youngest of the state colleges, known for an AACSB-accredited business school, a five-school interdisciplinary core instead of a shopping-cart distribution model, and a wooded campus in the Ramapo Valley foothills not far from Manhattan.

6,000 students · est. 1969

The direct descendant of the nation's first public normal school, founded in 1839 under education reformer Horace Mann, known for teacher education that still anchors the campus, food-and-nutrition and fashion programs built on its home-economics roots, and alumna Christa McAuliffe, the teacher selected for the Challenger flight.

6,000 students · est. 1839

A Willamette Valley public university founded by Monmouth, Illinois settlers, Oregon's historic normal school, known for education programs, Wolves athletics, and a college town that stayed dry for 144 years.

6,000 students · est. 1856

A private, career-focused college on a hillside above Lake Champlain in Burlington, Vermont, known for its upside-down curriculum that puts majors first, top-ranked game design and digital forensics programs, and a campus of converted Victorian mansions.

6,000 students · est. 1878

A private university in Chester on the Delaware River between Philadelphia and Wilmington, known for nursing, engineering and hospitality programs, a previous life of nearly a century as Pennsylvania Military College, and Pride teams in the Middle Atlantic Conference.

6,000 students · est. 1821

A public university in Rock Hill, South Carolina, just south of the North Carolina line, known for its 1886 roots as a teaching school, a strong visual and performing arts profile, and Eagles teams in the Big South Conference.

6,000 students · est. 1886

A Peoria university founded in 1897 by philanthropist Lydia Moss Bradley, with engineering and interactive media programs tied to Caterpillar's hometown headquarters and one of the first game-design curricula in the country.

5,400 students · est. 1897

Founded in 1948 as a nonsectarian research university sponsored by the American Jewish community, Brandeis pairs a small undergraduate body of about 3,600 with graduate strength in the sciences and an International Business School.

5,300 students · est. 1948

The only college in the United States founded and administered by the Dominican Friars, known for the team-taught Development of Western Civilization core and men's basketball Final Four runs in 1973 and 1987.

5,000 students · est. 1917

A mid-size public university in New England's second-largest city, founded in 1874 as a normal school, known for education, nursing and occupational-therapy pipelines into Worcester's hospital and school systems, and a cross-registration consortium that lets students pull classes from a dozen nearby colleges.

5,000 students · est. 1874

Virginia's young public liberal-arts university, opened in 1960 as a two-year branch of William and Mary and remade into a residential campus from the 1990s on, known for the President's Leadership Program, the Ferguson Center for the Arts, and a Captain identity rooted in Newport News shipbuilding.

5,000 students · est. 1960

One of the oldest public universities in Virginia, founded in Farmville in 1839 and long the state's teachers college, known for education and business pipelines, a Lancer campus on the High Bridge Trail, and a civics tradition tied to nearby Appomattox and Prince Edward County's school-closing history.

5,000 students · est. 1839

Western Maryland's mountain university, founded in 1898 as the state's second normal school, known for an Allegheny-front campus where the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad still steams into town, plus education, nursing and Appalachian-studies programs that treat the mountains as both home field and syllabus.

5,000 students · est. 1898

A selective public liberal arts college on the Genesee Valley village green, known for its Wadsworth normal-school founding, a Phi Beta Kappa chapter, and Blue Knights teams led by mascot Victor E. Knight.

5,000 students · est. 1871

A Jesuit university in the heart of Scranton, Pennsylvania, known for strong physical therapy, occupational therapy and nursing pipelines, an AACSB-accredited business school, and Royals athletics in the Landmark Conference.

5,000 students · est. 1888

A private college on South Hill above Cayuga Lake in Ithaca, New York, known for the Roy H. Park School of Communications, an integrated music, theatre and dance school rooted in its conservatory origins, and Bombers teams in the Liberty League.

5,000 students · est. 1892

Missouri's designated public liberal arts university in Kirksville, known for a demanding liberal Studies Program with writing-enhanced courses, strong graduate-placement rates in medicine and law, and Bulldogs teams in the Great Lakes Valley Conference.

5,000 students · est. 1867

A private university between the San Bernardino Mountains and Southern California's Inland Empire, known for the self-designed Johnston Center with narrative evaluations, a spatial studies program tied to nearby Esri, and Bulldogs teams in the SCIAC.

5,000 students · est. 1907

A private university of about 4,900 students in Indianapolis, famous for back-to-back NCAA title game runs in 2010 and 2011, a live bulldog mascot line and a Lacy School of Business wired into Indianapolis internships.

4,900 students · est. 1855

A private university of about 4,900 students in Iowa's capital, famous for the Drake Relays track meet, one of the oldest journalism schools in the country and a law school within walking distance of the state capitol.

4,900 students · est. 1881

A Nazarene university perched on the Point Loma peninsula with the Pacific on three sides, known for nursing, education and a biology program that uses the tidepools below campus as a lab.

4,800 students · est. 1902

A waterfront campus on Mount Hope Bay in Bristol, home to Rhode Island's only accredited architecture program and a marine biology program that samples the bay from the university's own dock.

4,400 students · est. 1956

A Boston university founded as a women's college in 1899, still undergraduate-women at the core with coed graduate programs, and nationally known for nursing, social work and its library and information science school.

4,300 students · est. 1899

A Worcester research university where Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung delivered their only American lectures in 1909, and where physics professor Robert Goddard's liquid-fuel rocket work is commemorated in the library that bears his name.

4,100 students · est. 1887

The nation's oldest private military college and its self-declared birthplace of ROTC, famous for civil engineering, a cybersecurity program with NSA designations and a Cadet-to-alumni pipeline into every service branch.

4,000 students · est. 1819

Connecticut's designated public liberal-arts university, founded in 1889 as a normal school in the old thread-mill city of Willimantic, known for an education pipeline that staffs classrooms across the state, a compact residential campus on the Willimantic River, and liberal-arts seminars instead of lecture-hall general education.

4,000 students · est. 1889

The UNC system's public liberal arts campus in the Blue Ridge foothills, founded in 1927 as a junior college and now the only exclusively undergraduate campus in the system, known for a renowned atmospheric sciences program, a strong undergraduate-research culture, and seminar-style general education.

4,000 students · est. 1927

A public liberal arts college on a mesa overlooking Durango in the San Juan Mountains, descended from a 1911 agricultural school on deeded army-fort land, known for tuition-free education for enrolled members of federally recognized tribes, an adventure-education major that uses the mountains as a classroom, and one of the more diverse student bodies among Colorado four-year schools.

4,000 students · est. 1911

One of Iowa's oldest private colleges, set in the bluff country of Fayette, known for its Peacocks nickname and for a long-running online and military education network that reaches far beyond the northeast Iowa campus.

4,000 students · est. 1857

A public university in Madison, South Dakota, rebuilt since the 1980s around technology, with an entire college dedicated to computer and cyber sciences, and Trojans teams in the NAIA's North Star Athletic Association.

4,000 students · est. 1881

A private Benedictine university on a hilltop above the Missouri River in Bismarck, North Dakota, known for nursing and business programs, a Year-Round Campus model that speeds degree completion, and Marauders teams in the Northern Sun.

4,000 students · est. 1959

A Catholic university of the Congregation of Holy Cross perched on a North Portland bluff overlooking the Willamette River, known for one of the Northwest's larger Catholic nursing programs, the scenic Bluff campus, and Pilots teams in the West Coast Conference.

4,000 students · est. 1901

The oldest university in the American West, a private campus in Salem, Oregon, across the street from the Oregon State Capitol, known for its College of Law, the Hallie Ford Museum of Art, government and sustainability programs, and Bearcats teams in the Northwest Conference.

4,000 students · est. 1842

The Lasallian school in the Bronx founded in 1853, long named Manhattan College and renamed Manhattan University in 2024, with a century-old reputation in civil and chemical engineering and a commuter-friendly culture.

3,800 students · est. 1853

New Hampshire's public liberal-arts college in the Monadnock Region, grown from a 1909 normal school into a residential campus known for its Integrative Studies seminars, a safety-studies program few colleges offer, and an Owl fandom that packs the gym through long Monadnock winters.

3,000 students · est. 1909

The University of Hawaii's Big Island campus on the windward side below Maunakea, grown from a 1947 vocational college into a small residential university known for the Daniel K. Inouye College of Pharmacy, tropical agriculture and marine-science field work, and the 'Imiloa Astronomy Center's blend of Hawaiian culture and astronomy.

3,000 students · est. 1947

The youngest of Indiana University's five regional campuses, founded in 1971 in Richmond on the Indiana-Ohio line, known for an online RN-to-BSN nursing track, small-class liberal-arts degrees built for commuter students, and a hometown whose jazz-recording history most campuses its size cannot touch.

3,000 students · est. 1971

A prairie normal school founded in 1901 that grew into Aberdeen's residential university, known for teacher education and business degrees that serve the northern Great Plains, the South Dakota Art Museum's Harvey Dunn collection on campus, and online programs that reach students far beyond the wheat belt.

3,000 students · est. 1901

A private Lutheran university in northwest Indiana known for the Chapel of the Resurrection and its huge circular stained-glass window, strong engineering and nursing programs, and a campus under two hours from downtown Chicago.

3,000 students · est. 1859

A Catholic university of the Sisters of Mercy woven into Newport's Gilded Age estate row, known for nursing, business and justice studies, the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy, and Seahawks teams newly elevated to Division I in the Coastal Athletic Association.

3,000 students · est. 1934

A small public STEM university in Butte, Montana, the copper capital once called the Richest Hill on Earth, known for mining, geological and petroleum engineering programs, health-care fields, and Orediggers teams in the Frontier Conference.

3,000 students · est. 1900

A private university in Westerville, Ohio, founded by the United Brethren in Christ, known for admitting women from its founding, an Integrative Studies core, a strong musical theatre program, and Cardinals teams in the Ohio Athletic Conference.

3,000 students · est. 1847

The language-study capital of America (the Language Schools and Schools Abroad), famous for environmental studies and writing intensity.

2,900 students · est. 1800

A liberal-arts college famous for its Jan Plan (a January term), museum of art and environmental programs.

2,000 students · est. 1813

A Benedictine liberal arts college on a hill above Manchester, New Hampshire, home to the New Hampshire Institute of Politics where presidential primary candidates routinely stop, and to one of New England's larger undergraduate nursing programs.

2,000 students · est. 1889

A small private university on the Ohio River in Evansville, Indiana, known for owning Harlaxton College, a Victorian manor in England that serves as its study-abroad campus, strong theatre and physical therapy programs, and Purple Aces teams in the Missouri Valley Conference.

2,000 students · est. 1854

A top liberal-arts college famous for government and legal studies, Arctic studies (Peary-MacMillan collection) and food culture.

1,900 students · est. 1794

A liberal-arts college famous for its thesis (all seniors complete one), debate tradition and Short Term intensive courses.

1,900 students · est. 1855