Public colleges and universities account for almost 75 percent of all undergraduate students in the U.S. The best public colleges in Indiana provide broad access to reputable degree programs, affordable tuition, and sprawling educational communities.
Among Indiana’s schools are some well-known colleges and universities, including the University of Notre Dame, Purdue University, and Butler University. While tuition and student population vary greatly among these schools, each boasts a high graduation rate. The state’s largest public university, Indiana University Bloomington, also notes a high graduation rate for its roughly 40,000 students and offers tuition just above the national average at $11,000.
Find college admissions consultants in your state.
Additionally, students hoping to attend a school with a religious affiliation have nearly 30 options to choose from. Students at these schools can study areas like engineering, business, philosophy, religious studies, and law. Indiana offers loan forgiveness programs for health care workers who work in areas with labor shortages as well as for lawyers providing public legal aid. Additionally, graduates of Indiana University’s Maurer School of Law pursuing public interest law can apply for a special grant program that will help cover the cost of preparing and sitting for the bar exam.
With town names like Popcorn and Santa Claus, it is clear Indiana is no stranger to a good time. Along with these unique towns, Indiana also hosts the Indianapolis 500, a long-distance auto race; boasts a thriving art scene; and has been home to iconic celebrities, including Larry Bird, James Dean, and David Letterman. Students wanting to experience all Indiana has to offer while studying have the option of attending one of Indiana’s more than 50 higher education institutes.
Explore Indiana’s more than 50 colleges and universities to find a program and future career path that’s right for you.
Public and private colleges and universities operate under different business models. Public colleges and universities are owned by the state and receive both state and federal funding to operate. Private colleges and universities are private companies with private funding. If you’re looking at the pros and cons of private vs. public colleges, consider that many public colleges provide diverse course offerings, influential professors, and an excellent return on your investment.
Public colleges are schools that receive most of their funding from tax revenues. As a result, the cost of a bachelor’s degree at a public university is often lower than the equivalent cost at a private college — especially for students attending a public school in their home state. Attending a college in-state is usually the cheapest option. Private universities and colleges can be very competitive with their funding opportunities, so do not simply believe that private colleges are always going to be more expensive. According to National Center for Educational Statistics, the average annual cost (tuition, fees, room and board for full-time students) at a public university was slightly over $20,000. In contrast, private universities cost, on average, nearly $43,000 annually. But in the end, the cost of college comes down to each student’s academic and financial situation.
This list is composed entirely of public colleges and universities that offer bachelor’s degrees. We’ve identified 15 public universities in Indiana. To be included in our list of the best public colleges in Indiana, shcools must receive direct funding from the state, be fully accredited, and offer a broad range of bachelor’s degress.
The people affiliated with a school are ultimately what make it great! If you are serious about finding the best colleges and universities for a bachelor’s degree, you should be asking where the most influential professors are teaching and whether their graduates are themselves advancing the school’s reputation for academic excellence in their fields of study.
Most ranking sites rely on an opaque combination of reputation surveys and arbitrary performance metrics. Concentrated Influence provides a ranking that is freer from bias, insulated from manipulation, and reflective of real-world educational outcomes.
To rank the influence of schools, we first determine the influence of scholars and professionals based on the number of citations and publications they have had over the past 10 years. In addition to publications and citations, we consider the web links to and from these sources, and the page views of those sources. We then match the influential people to their alma maters and institutions of employment, so that their influence is attributed to those schools. Our machine-learning Influence Ranking algorithm produces a numerical score of academic achievements, merits, and citations across Wikipedia, wikidata, Crossref, Semantic Scholar and an ever-growing body of data. If you are interested in exploring how and why we rank by influence, explore our methodology in more depth.
Tuition + fees
$10K
Acceptance
67%
Graduation
83%
Student body
43K
Median SAT/ACT
1315/28
Purdue University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$11K
Acceptance
80%
Graduation
80%
Student body
41K
Median SAT/ACT
1255/27
Indiana University Bloomington’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$10K
Acceptance
87%
Graduation
67%
Student body
20K
Ball State University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$9K
Acceptance
92%
Graduation
41%
Student body
10K
Indiana State University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$10K
Graduation
22%
Student body
46K
Purdue University Global’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$10K
Acceptance
79%
Graduation
52%
Student body
24K
Median SAT/ACT
1100/22
Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$8K
Acceptance
87%
Graduation
38%
Student body
4K
Median SAT/ACT
1040/20
Indiana University South Bend’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$6K
Graduation
28%
Student body
8K
Vincennes University’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$8K
Acceptance
67%
Graduation
45%
Student body
3K
Median SAT/ACT
1035/20
Indiana University East’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$9K
Acceptance
94%
Graduation
53%
Student body
8K
Median SAT/ACT
1075/22
University of Southern Indiana’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$8K
Acceptance
30%
Graduation
42%
Student body
7K
Median SAT/ACT
1070/21
Purdue University Northwest’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$8K
Acceptance
85%
Graduation
36%
Student body
4K
Median SAT/ACT
1035/20
Indiana University Southeast’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$8K
Acceptance
82%
Graduation
32%
Student body
3K
Median SAT/ACT
1005/19
Indiana University Northwest’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$8K
Acceptance
83%
Graduation
43%
Student body
3K
Median SAT/ACT
1050/20
Indiana University Kokomo’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Tuition + fees
$9K
Acceptance
83%
Graduation
40%
Student body
7K
Median SAT/ACT
1080/21
Indiana University–Purdue University Fort Wayne’s faculty and alumni have been influential in:
Many of our 2022 undergraduate focused rankings look considerably different than 2021. That’s because we took a fundamentally different apporach. For 2021 we utiulized our Concentrated Influence algorithm, designed to take away the size advantage larger schools have when we rank their faculty and alumni’s academic influence. Concentrated influence highlights smaller schools that are proportionally as successful as larger universities at cultivating influential alumni and faculty.
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