Vanderbilt University

Vanderbilt University is a private, nonsectarian, coeducational, research university located in Nashville, Tennessee. Vanderbilt is the largest private employer in Middle Tennessee and the second largest private employer in the state.

Named for shipping and rail magnate "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided the school with its initial $1 million endowment, Vanderbilt was founded in 1873.

Vanderbilt enrolls nearly 12,000 students from all 50 U.S. states and many foreign countries.

The university is accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools to award bachelor, master, education specialist and doctor degrees.

U.S. News & World Report, in its 2010 rankings, placed Vanderbilt 17th among national universities. The Graduate School of Education-Peabody College was ranked first.

The campus covers 330 acres. Vanderbilt recognizes more than 300 student organizations, ranging from academic-major societies to recreational sports clubs. The athletic teams are called the Commodores.

With 15 sororities and 18 fraternities, the university has an active Greek life.

Arts life at Vanderbilt includes performances, exhibits, lectures and workshops by faculty and internationally known guest artists.

The university is organized into the following academic divisions:

Blair School of Music
College of Arts and Science
Divinity School
Graduate School
Law School
Owen Graduate School of Management
Peabody College of Education and Human Development
School of Engineering
School of Medicine
School of Nursing

Among the famous alumni are Lamar Alexander, former Governor of Tennessee and a current U.S. Senator; Tipper Gore; David Boaz, Executive Vice President of the Cato Institute; singers Dinah Shore and Roseanne Cash; Amy Grant; actors Molly Sims and Joe Bob Briggs; Poet Laureates Allen Tate, Robert Penn Warren (who also won the Pulitzer Prize), and Randall Jarell; novelists James Patterson and James Dickey; Willie Geist, a host of MSNBC's Morning Joe; Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler; Offensive tackle Chris Williams; MLB players Pedro Alvarez and David Price; and biochemist Stanford Moore and microcredit pioneer Muhammad Yunus--who both won Nobel Prizes (Yunus was also a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom). U.S. Vice Presidents, John Nance Garner and Al Gore, Jr.--the latter also a Nobel Laureate--and journalist David Brinkley attended the university but did not graduate.

Campus Location

2101 West End Avenue
Nashville, TN 37240
USA
Main Tel: (615) 322-7311
Web Site

The campus is in a large city.

Highlights

Where the school stands out most compared to other schools (details below):

Many students concentrating in religion and philosophy, law, liberal arts, medicine, engineering, and mathematics.
Large number of programs of study offered.
High faculty salary.
High SAT scores (combined Verbal and Math).
Large number of students.
Selective admissions.
Number of dorm rooms for students.
Unusually high availability of athletic financial aid.
Good faculty-to-student ratio.
High percentage of students are from out-of-state.

Other important characteristics:

Faculty tenure system
On-campus hospital
Library on-campus
Campus housing available
Study abroad option
Distance learning available
Weekend study option
Part-time classes available
ROTC
Athlete financial aid

Degrees Awarded (in 2008-2009)

Degree	Total Earned	Different Programs
Bachelor	1,542	70
Master	1,044	87
First-professional degree	353	3
Doctorale	297	49

Students

Student enrollment was 11,847 in 2007-2008 (9,351 full-time equivalent).

About 50% of the freshmen class in 2008-2009 was male and women were 50% of the class.

Undergrads are 53% of enrolled students, graduate students are 37%, and those seeking first-professional graduate degrees represent 10%.

About 4% of freshmen are from countries other than the US. Students living in the US make up 96% of incoming freshmen.

Tuition and Other Costs (2008-2009)

Item	Cost
State Tuition and fees	$ 37,005
Room	$ 7,828
Board	$ 4,200
Books and supplies	$ 1,208
Other	$ 2,062

Financial Aid: Vanderbilt University participates in US Title IV financial assistance programs.

Please refer to BrainTrack's financial aid articles section for background information.

Similar Schools

Based on computer comparisons against all other US colleges, these schools appear to be most similar to Vanderbilt University:

	School	Location	Enrollment
1	Washington University in St Louis	Saint Louis, MO	13,382
2	Duke University	Durham, NC	13,598
3	Carnegie Mellon University	Pittsburgh, PA	10,326
4	Tufts University	Medford, MA	9,758
5	University of Notre Dame	Notre Dame, IN	11,733
6	Cornell University	Ithaca, NY	19,800
7	Dartmouth College	Hanover, NH	5,849
8	Case Western Reserve University	Cleveland, OH	9,844
9	Johns Hopkins University	Baltimore, MD	19,682
10	Villanova University	Villanova, PA	10,470

Faculty

Tenure (2008-2009):

Full-Time Faculty		Total
With tenure		866
Without tenure; working toward tenure		344
Without tenure; tenure not available		1,875

Housing and Meals

Vanderbilt University provides on-campus housing for 5,689 of its 9,351 (full-time) students (as of 2008-2009). The school requires freshmen to live on campus.

Athletics

School sports include football, basketball, baseball, and track. The school is in the Southeastern Conference for major sports.

The school offers financial aid for athletes. Of students receiving athletic financial aid, 154 male students received the aid (men were 65% of those receiving aid) and 84 women were awarded financial aid based on athletics (representing 35% of students receiving such aid) .

Admissions (2008-2009)

Applicants	Admitted
Men	28%
Women	23%
All	25%

SAT Test Scores:

SAT	Middle 50%
Verbal	650-740
Math	680-760
Writing	650-730

Programs of Study

(Number of degrees awarded in 2008-2009 in parentheses)

ART STUDIES (17 awarded)

Art/Art Studies

BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT (277 awarded)

Accounting
Business Administration and Management
Business Administration, Management and Operations
Finance
Human Resources Development
Marketing/Marketing Management
Operations Management and Supervision
Organizational Behavior Studies

COMPUTER SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING (57 awarded)

Computer Engineering
Computer Science

DRAMA AND PERFORMING ARTS (4 awarded)

Drama and Dramatics/Theatre Arts

EDUCATION AND TEACHING (242 awarded)

Counselor Education/School Counseling and Guidance Services
Early Childhood Education and Teaching
Education
Education/Teaching Individuals - Hearing Impairments
Educational Evaluation and Research
Educational Leadership and Administration
Educational, Instructional, and Curriculum Supervision
Elementary Education and Teaching
English/Language Arts Teacher Education
Higher Education/Higher Education Administration
International and Comparative Education
Mathematics Teacher Education
Music Teacher Education
Reading Teacher Education
Science Teacher Education/General Science Teacher Education
Secondary Education and Teaching
Special Education and Teaching
Teacher Education/Profess Development, Levels & Methods
Teaching English as Second/Foreign Language/ESL Language Instructor
Technology Teacher Education/Industrial Arts Teacher Education

ENGINEERING (374 awarded)

Biomedical/Medical Engineering
Chemical Engineering
Civil Engineering
Electrical, Electronics and Communications Engineering
Engineering Science
Environmental/Environmental Health Engineering
Materials Science
Mechanical Engineering

FAMILY AND SOCIAL WORK (55 awarded)

Child Development
Community Organization and Advocacy
Public Policy Analysis

FINE ARTS (4 awarded)

Art History, Criticism and Conservation
Fine/Studio Arts

LAW (244 awarded)

Law (LLB, JD)
Programs for Foreign Lawyers (LLM, MCL)

LIBERAL ARTS (893 awarded)

African-American/Black Studies
American/United States Studies/Civilization
Anthropology
Applied Economics
Central/Middle and Eastern European Studies
Classical/Ancient Mediterranean/Near Eastern Studies & Archaeology
Classics/Classical Languages, Lit & Linguistics
Comparative Literature
Creative Writing
Development Economics and International Development
East Asian Studies
Economics
English Language and Literature
European Studies/Civilization
French Language and Literature
German Language and Literature
German Studies
History
Latin American Studies
Liberal Arts and Sciences/Liberal Studies
Multi-/Interdisciplinary Studies
Political Science and Government
Portuguese Language and Literature
Romance Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics
Russian Language and Literature
Russian Studies
Social Sciences
Sociology
Spanish Language and Literature
Spanish and Iberian Studies
Western European Studies
Women's Studies

MATHEMATICS (22 awarded)

Mathematics

MEDIA (42 awarded)

Communication Studies/Speech Communication and Rhetoric

MEDICAL ADMINISTRATION (0 awarded)

Health/Health Care Administration/Management

MEDICAL SUPPORT AND TECHNOLOGY (31 awarded)

Audiology/Audiologist and Hearing Sciences
Audiology/Audiologist and Speech-Language Pathology/Pathologist
Speech-Language Pathology/Pathologist

MEDICINE (175 awarded)

Health/Medical Physics
Medical Scientist (MS, PhD)
Medicine (MD)
Neuroscience
Public Health, General (MPH, DPH)

MUSIC (32 awarded)

Music Performance
Music Theory and Composition
Music
Piano and Organ
Violin, Viola, Guitar and Other Stringed Instruments
Voice and Opera

NURSING AND EMERGENCY MEDICINE (282 awarded)

Adult Health Nurse/Nursing
Clinical Nurse Specialist
Critical Care Nursing
Family Practice Nurse/Nurse Practitioner
Maternal/Child Health and Neonatal Nurse/Nursing
Nurse Midwife/Nursing Midwifery
Nursing Administration (MSN, MS, PhD)
Nursing Science (MS, PhD)
Nursing
Pediatric Nurse/Nursing
Psychiatric/Mental Health Nurse/Nursing

PHOTOGRAPHY AND COMMERCIAL ART (4 awarded)

Film/Cinema Studies

RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY (136 awarded)

Divinity/Ministry (BD, MDiv)
Jewish/Judaic Studies
Philosophy
Religion/Religious Studies
Theology/Theological Studies

SCIENCE (230 awarded)

Astronomy
Biochemistry
Biochemistry/Biophysics and Molecular Biology
Bioinformatics
Biological and Biomedical Sciences
Biology/Biological Sciences
Cell/Cellular and Molecular Biology
Chemistry
Ecology, Evolution, Systematics and Population Biology
Geology/Earth Science
Human/Medical Genetics
Microbiology
Molecular Biology
Molecular Physiology
Oncology and Cancer Biology
Pathology/Experimental Pathology
Pharmacology
Physics
Science, Technology and Society

THERAPY AND COUNSELING (115 awarded)

Cognitive Science
Community Psychology
Developmental and Child Psychology
Psychology