Truman State University

Admission to the university is based upon a holistic review of a candidate's academic record, with the strongest consideration being given to those who have a combined ability score of 140 or higher. The combined ability score is calculated by adding the percentage of students in the applicant's graduating class that the applicant outranks and the percentage of students the applicant outscored on a nationally standardized test (usually the ACT, although the SAT is also accepted). Admissions decisions are also based, however, on a mandatory application essay, the applicant's resume, and the applicant's high school and extracurricular record. According to the Princeton Review, Truman has a selectivity rating of 88, a 68% acceptance rate, with applicants having a 3.79 average high school GPA,[18] and an 88% retention rate after freshman year.[19] All applicants must have 4 credits of English, 3 credits of math, 3 credits of science, 2 credits of foreign language, 2 credits of social studies, and 1 credit of fine art. The average GPA of an admitted student is 3.25 on a 4.0 scale, with 50% of all admitted students ranking in the top 10% of their class, and the median ACT range is 25–31.

On July 20, 1985, the state of Missouri charged Truman State University with serving as the state's public liberal arts and sciences university. To meet this commitment to the people of Missouri, the Truman faculty and administration created the Liberal Studies Program, the general education curriculum undergraduates complete to receive a Truman degree.

Truman State University entrance

The School of Arts and Letters is the home of the departments of Art, Classical and Modern Languages, English and Linguistics, Music, and Theatre. Degrees offered through the school include Art, Art History, Classics, English, French, German, Linguistics, Music, Romance Languages, Russian, Spanish, Theatre, and Visual Communications. In addition to the 17 distinct undergraduate majors offered, the school also offers 6 graduate programs, including Music and English.[20]

The School of Business offers degrees in Business Administration (BA or BS) with an emphasis in Finance, Management, Marketing, and International Business (BA only). In addition, a BS and MAcc in Accounting are offered, with the graduate program ranked third in the nation in terms of CPA passage rates. The School of Business is also AACSB accredited.[21]

The School of Health Sciences & Education offers degrees in communication disorders (graduate and undergraduate), nursing, health science, exercise science, and education (MAE only). Education students can specialize in elementary education, special education, English, exercise science, foreign language, music, mathematics, science, and visual arts.[22]

The School of Science and Mathematics offers degrees in agricultural science, biology, chemistry, mathematics, computer science, and physics.[23] The school also offers Missouri's only undergraduate interdisciplinary degree program in mathematical biology[24] which has connections and resources available through the Intercollegiate Biomathematics Alliance.[25] The school also coordinates the Missouri Pre-STEM Pathways Program[26] with Moberly Area Community College, Metropolitan Community College, and St. Charles Community College.

The School of Social and Cultural Studies offers degrees in communication, Economics, History, Justice Systems, Military Science (minor only), Philosophy & Religion, Political Science, Psychology, Geography (minor only), and Sociology/Anthropology.[27]

Students are also free to create their interdisciplinary majors or to minor in any of the approved interdisciplinary minors, which include African/African-American Studies, Asian Studies, Classical Studies, Cognitive Sciences, Disability Studies, Environmental Studies, Folklore, Forensic Science, International Studies, Italian Studies, Mathematical Biology, Medieval Studies and Women's and Gender Studies.[28]

In the 1960s, the university built Dobson Hall (1961), Ryle Hall (1963), Missouri Hall (1965), and Centennial Hall (1967). There are three other residence halls on campus: Blanton-Nason-Brewer (1948, Brewer added in 1959), Ezra C. Grim Hall (1923), and West Campus Suites (2006). The residence halls are maintained by Residence Life, an administrative body of professionals and students who live in the halls and act as student advisors (SAs) and hall directors. Truman's residence halls underwent a $90 million renovation schedule in the 2000s and 2010s. This project included the construction of West Campus Suites in 2006, the renovation of Missouri Hall in 2006, Blanton-Nason-Brewer in 2007, and Dobson in 2008. Ryle Hall's two-year renovation concluded in the summer of 2011, and Centennial underwent a two-year renovation concluding in 2014.

• Dobson Hall is coed by wing and houses roughly 400 students.[29] Dobson Hall closed for the 2019–20 academic year but reopened one floor in the 2020-21 and 2021-22 years, with plans to reopen the second floor in 2022-23.[30]
• Ryle Hall is the second largest hall at Truman. This coed residence hall houses nearly 600 students in suite-style rooms.[29]
• Centennial Hall is the largest residence hall on campus. This coed hall houses nearly 600 students in suite-style rooms. Centennial Hall will be closed for the 2022-23 and 2023-24 academic years to undergo renovations, particularly to its windows.[31][29]

• Missouri Hall is a coed residence hall that houses 518 students, making it the third largest on campus. Missouri Hall is made up of seven different wings. On both the north and south sides of the building three wings join with a common lounge. The two common lounges are linked by a seventh "crossover" wing. From overhead, the building is shaped like an elongated asterisk. [29] [31]
• Blanton-Nason-Brewer offers three floors of suite-style, coed living arrangements to students. Originally three separate buildings connected by breezeways, the building underwent a major renovation in the 2007–2008 academic year and is now one, unified residence hall. [29]
• West Campus Suites, just northwest of Centennial Hall, opened its doors to 416 students in Fall 2006. Currently, all floors are coed by suite. [29]
• Truman also offers the Campbell Apartments for student living. Campbell is located next to the tennis courts just east of Stokes Stadium.[32] Yet another option is Farm Hall, located at the University Farm. Only four students, often majoring in agricultural science, live on the farm each year.[33] Their work on the farm helps them gain useful first-hand experience, as well as help pay for room and board.

Truman offers approximately 250 different student organizations[34] in the following areas:

An organization that has garnered considerable attention since its inception is the Bulldog Student Investment Fund, a group in which student analysts invest a portion of the university's endowment in public equities (stockstoto outperform the market. The organization hopes to eventually use the proceeds from the fund's returns to sponsor scholarships for Truman students.[35] In 2015, members from the Bulldog Student Investment Fund, representing Truman State, achieved the first place prize among the five competing universities in the St. Louis CFA Institute Challenge and went on to compete at nationals.[36]

Approximately 20% of the student body is affiliated with a social Greek organization. Truman hosts nine sororities and fifteen fraternities.[37][38]

The second Gum Tree near the southwest corner of Ophelia Parrish Hall

• The weather vane atop Kirk Memorial is welded in place so that it will always point northeast, in honor of the school's previous name and its location.[39]
• The annual football game against Northwest Missouri State University was established in 1930 when Northwest president Uel W. Lamkin sent Fair a polished hickory stick from the farm where the former president Eugene Fair was born. The "Hickory Stick" was contested annually until 2013, when Truman and Northwest Missouri began competing in different athletic conferences.[40]
• A tradition has arisen in which students attach wads of gum to a designated tree known as the "Gum Tree." It is believed that a ban on gum chewing in class started a tradition of discarding gum inside a hollow suit of armor sometime in the 1920s, and that eventually this was replaced by the Gum Tree. Students leave their gum on the tree to bring them good luck on exams. [41]