The University
Founded in 1875, IUP is a vibrant, comprehensive, research-based, teaching-focused, student-centered learning community that goes beyond what one would expect from a state school. Find more facts about IUP.
IUP combines the opportunities of a big university with the highly personalized and intimate learning-centered environment of a small college.
More than fourteen thousand undergraduate and graduate students are currently enrolled in the accredited and nationally recognized programs at IUP, enjoying traditional and nontraditional classroom experiences, engaging in research and service activities with their faculty mentors, becoming lifelong learners, preparing for rewarding careers and productive lives, and developing leadership skills for effective citizenship.
IUP also makes significant contributions to the economic and cultural strength of the region, the commonwealth, and the nation through education, scholarship, and service, both as an individual institution and through collaboration within the State System of Higher Education, with other educational institutions, and with business, government, human services, and professional organizations.
IUP is consistently ranked among the best institutions in the region for cost, quality, and comfort by a wide variety of sources including The Princeton Review’s Best Colleges publications; Donald Asher’s Cool Colleges: For the Hyper-Intelligent, Self-Directed, Late Blooming and Just Plain Different; Kiplinger’s Personal Finance Magazine; Arco’s Dollarwise Guide to American Colleges; Barron’s Best Buys in College Education; The New York Times; Money magazine; and U.S. News and World Report, among others.
IUP is accredited by the Middle States Association Commission on Higher Education.
The Campus
IUP’s beautiful main campus is located in Indiana, Pa., and spans more than 350 acres. A combination of historical charm and state-of-the-art facilities, it includes seventy-five major buildings and eleven athletic fields.
Affiliate campuses are located in Northpointe (Armstrong County) and Punxsutawney, Pa.
The IUP Academy of Culinary Arts also is in Punxsutawney.
IUP offers courses through the State System’s Dixon Center in Harrisburg and through distance education.
The Stapleton/Stabley building, located on the Indiana campus, is the central university library. The IUP library system has a collection of more than 900,000 books, maintains subscriptions to about fifteen thousand serials in multiple formats, and houses more than a hundred thousand audiovisual materials.
The Students
IUP students are bright, inquisitive, and accomplished. In 2006, IUP students included a Fulbright Scholarship winner, a Goldwater Scholarship winner, and a Syed Ali-Zaidi Award winner. In Fall 2007, there were:
- 14,018 students—44 percent male; 56 percent female; 8 percent of nontraditional age
- 11,724 undergraduates
- 2,294 graduate students
- 1,811 (13 percent) minority students
- 626 (4 percent) international students
- Students from forty-five states and seventy-three countries
- 3,851 (27 percent) living on campus
The Faculty
IUP students enjoy an 18-to-1 student/faculty ratio. Our faculty scholars love to teach. Nearly all classes are taught by faculty members, as opposed to graduate assistants.
Since 1959, IUP faculty members have won nearly sixty Fulbright Teacher Exchange Awards, allowing faculty to study and research in more than a score of countries.
Faculty research has been sponsored by institutions such as the National Science Foundation, NASA, the American Chemical Society, the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the U.S. Department of Education.
IUP faculty members regularly publish books and edit, coordinate, and contribute to professional journals.
The Degrees
Not only does IUP offer an abundance of undergraduate and master’s programs, but it is the only state university to offer degrees at the doctoral level. Degrees are offered from the broader, more traditional (philosophy, anthropology) to the career specific (safety sciences, respiratory therapy). IUP boasts:
- More than one hundred forty undergraduate degree programs, which combine a rigorous curriculum with numerous internship, study-abroad, research, and other experiential learning opportunities
- A nationally renowned honors program through the Robert E. Cook Honors College
- Sixty-one master’s programs
- Ten doctoral degrees
Student Life
IUP students benefit from the leadership, professional, service, and social and personal opportunities offered by more than two hundred exciting student clubs and organizations, including eighteen fraternities and fourteen sororities. Find out more about student life at IUP.
The Athletics
IUP competes in the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference and is an NCAA Division II member.
- The university sponsors eight varsity sports for men and eleven for women.
- Scholarships are available for all varsity sports.
- IUP students also get involved in a variety of club and intramural sports.
Find out more about athletics at IUP.
The Colors
IUP’s colors are crimson and gray.
The Value
IUP is nationally recognized for offering an education of real value. In addition to keeping tuition costs competitive (undergraduate tuition, not including housing or dining, for the 2007–2008 academic year was $6,695; graduate tuition was $7,544), IUP also disburses substantial financial aid in the form of scholarships, grants, work-study programs, and low-interest loans. In fact, more than 70 percent of IUP students receive financial assistance in one form or another.
