University of Kansas

By James A. Barham, PhD

In brief

The University of Kansas (KU), founded in 1865, has its flagship campus in Lawrence and branch campuses in Wichita, Salina, Leavenworth, Kansas City, and Overland Park. It enrolls more than 28,000 students in some 345 degree programs. By our measure of academic influence, it ranks #75 in the United States and #213 in the world. It admitted 93.5% of applicants for fall 2024; admitted students had a median SAT score of 1185 and a median ACT score of 24.

Its specialized centers include the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics and the Beach Center on Disability. From 1970 to 1978 it hosted the Integrated Humanities Program, an influential “great books” curriculum.

Where KU’s influence is strongest

KU’s influence is led by anthropology, where it ranks in the US top 25. Its strongest broad fields, by US rank in our data, are:

• Anthropology: #23 in the US (#55 in the world)
• Social work: #36
• History: #40
• Psychology: #44
• Earth sciences: #48

Within those fields, KU is a national leader in several specialties:

• #1 in the US and the world: forensic anthropology
• #4: environmental history and feminist sociology
• #5: paleobiology
• #7: entomology

By comparison, KU sits further back in literature (#106), nursing (#112), and religious studies (#177).

How we measure influence: these ranks come from the citations and recognition earned by a school’s faculty and alumni in each discipline, not from surveys or admissions statistics. See our methodology.

Notable people

KU-connected Nobel laureates include the chemist F. Sherwood Rowland, the economist Vernon L. Smith, and Juan Manuel Santos, winner of the Peace Prize. Its faculty and alumni also include the astronomer Clyde Tombaugh, the biologist Paul R. Ehrlich, the anthropologist Loren Eiseley, the playwright William Inge, the novelist Gillian Flynn, the actor Paul Rudd, the designer Kate Spade, the baseball statistician Bill James, and Kathleen Sebelius, former governor of Kansas. Our full lists of KU’s most influential alumni and faculty appear below.

Frequently asked questions

Is KU hard to get into? No. It admitted 93.5% of applicants for fall 2024; the middle half of admitted students scored 540–650 on the SAT reading section and 530–650 on math.

What does KU cost after financial aid? Tuition is $12,453 for Kansas residents and $31,332 for out-of-state students in 2025–26. The average net price for aided students with family incomes of $48,000–$75,000 was $16,017 in 2024–25; it ranged from about $15,373 for incomes of $30,000–$48,000 to $24,765 for incomes above $110,000.

How do KU graduates do? 70.3% of students who started in 2019 graduated within six years, and 86% of first-year students return for a second year. Ten years after starting college, former students had median earnings of $67,963.

What is KU best known for academically? By our influence data: anthropology, social work, and history, plus forensic anthropology, where it ranks first in the world.