Centrally Located

Illinois State University is located in the twin-city community of Bloomington-Normal, and is centrally located 137 miles southwest of Chicago and 164 miles northeast of St. Louis. The campus includes 61 major buildings, including...

10 residence halls and two university owned apartments

A Center for the Performing Arts containing a 460-seat theatre and an 830-seat concert hall.

Milner Library, which has over 1.6 million volumes and over 16,000 printed or electronic periodical subscriptions. In addition, reference services include email and real-time chat available on Milner's Web site through "Ask a Librarian."

Bone Student Center which includes the 3,500 seat Braden Auditorium.

The University planetarium seats 110 spectators at public and special group shows.

Illinois State is one of only 85 universities in the nation that maintains laboratory schools, Thomas Metcalf Elementary and University High School.

Redbird Arena and Hancock Stadium seat 10,200 and 15,000 respectively.

The University Galleries consist of three galleries with 7,500 square feet of exhibition space.

Quick Facts

Founded in 1857, Illinois State University was the first public university in the state and one of the Midwest's oldest institutions of higher education. It is a residential university that emphasizes undergraduate study.

Student profile

The fall 2009 enrollment is 20,856 including 18,344 undergraduates and 2,512 graduates.
11,886 (57 percent) of our students are women, and 8,970 (43 percent) are men.
Students from groups traditionally underrepresented in higher education account for 12 percent of all students, including 1,121 African-Americans, 415 Asians or Pacific Islanders, 871 Hispanics, and 87 Native Americans or Alaskans.
Of the students admitted for the 2009-2010 academic year, one half earned ACT composite scores of 23 to 27. A quarter of the admitted students scored 28 or above, and another quarter scored between 18 and 22.
The average high school grade point average of students admitted for 2009-2010 was 3.49 on a 4.0 scale.

Faculty, class size

Most of Illinois State’s 1,136 faculty members hold the highest degrees in their fields.
Ninety percent of undergraduate credit hours are taught by faculty members; the balance are taught by graduate assistants.
At least 68 percent of all classes have 29 or fewer students; 85 percent have 39 or fewer; and 89 percent have 49 or fewer.
The student-faculty ratio is 19 to one.

Academic colleges

Its 34 academic departments in six colleges offer 67 undergraduate programs in more than 188 fields of study. The Graduate School coordinates 39 master’s, two specialist, and eight doctoral programs.