Purdue University

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About Purdue University

Purdue University was founded in 1869 with substantial financing provided by industrialist John Purdue. Its purpose was to train students in agriculture and engineering. The school officially opened for business in 1874 and grew quickly.

By the end of the nineteenth century, Purdue had been organized into five schools: agriculture, mechanical engineering, civil engineering, electrical engineering, and pharmacy. Later, schools of education and home economics were added. An early attempt at creating a medical school was later abandoned.

In other respects, Purdue was spectacularly successful. By 1925 the university was home to the largest number of engineering students in the US. It remained the nation’s largest engineering school for the next half-century.

Today, Purdue operates four satellite campuses: in Hammond, Fort Wayne, Columbus, and Indianapolis. Overall, the Purdue system has a student body approaching 75,000 souls.

Purdue is associated with 13 Nobel Prize winners, including:

Physicists, Ben Roy Mottelson, Edward Mills Purcell, Julian Schwinger & Wolfgang Pauli
Chemists, Ei-ichi Negishi, Herbert C. Brown & Akira Suzuki
Economist, Vernon L. Smith

In addition, the Turing Award winning computer scientist, Alan J. Perlis, spent time here as a researcher.

Among other prominent Purdue-connected individuals, we may note the following:

Astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Virgil “Gus” Grissom, Roger Chaffee & Eugene Cernan
Heroic airline pilot, Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger
Mathematicians, Andrew Majda, Shreeram Shankar Abhyankar & Feydoon Shahidi
Computer scientists, Mikhail Atallah, Markus Kuhn & Jill Zimmerman
Computer software developer, Sanjiva Weerawarana
Physicist, Albert Overhauser
Chemist, C.N.R. Rao
Chemical engineer, Rakesh Agrawal
Molecular biologists, Seymour Benzer & Ronald Breaker
Microbiologist, Rita Colwell
Nanotechnology pioneers, Supriyo Datta & James Tour
Physiologist, Leslie Geddes
Economist, Hugo Sonnenschein
Anthropologist, Peter Peregrine
Novelist and playwright, Booth Tarkington
Actors, George Peppard & Kenneth Choi
Stand-up comic, Jim Gaffigan
Photographer, Margaret Bourke-White

According to Wikipedia, Purdue University is a public land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, and the flagship campus of the Purdue University system. The university was founded in 1869 after Lafayette businessman John Purdue donated land and money to establish a college of science, technology, and agriculture in his name. The first classes were held on September 16, 1874, with six instructors and 39 students. It has been ranked as among the best public universities in the United States by major institutional rankings, and is renowned for its engineering program.

Purdue University's Online Degrees

Purdue University Admissions, Retention, and Graduation Information

Annual Applications	Acceptance	Graduation Rate	Median SAT Score	Median ACT Score
59,436	69%	83%	1295	29

How Much Does Purdue University Cost To Attend?

Tuition (in-state)	Fees (in-state)
$9,718	$274

How Much Do Purdue University Graduates Make?

If you graduate from Purdue University, then you can expect to earn an average of $62,200 per year. You also have a 92% chance of being employed after 10 years.

Purdue University's Demographics

Demographic data is for full-time, on-campus students.

Student Body	Under-Grads	Graduates
44,298	35,655	8,643

Where is Purdue University?

Purdue University is located at Hovde Hall of Administration, West Lafayette IN 47907-2040

How Safe is Purdue University?

West Lafayette has a violent crime rate of less than .01% and a property crime rate of less than .01%.

What Is Purdue University Known For?

Purdue University is known for it's academic work in the following disciplines: