The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a public state-related land-grant research university with campuses and facilities throughout Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1855 as the Farmers' High School of Pennsylvania, Penn State was named the state's first land-grant university eight years later. Its primary campus, known as Penn State University Park, is located in State College and College Township in Centre County.
Penn State enrolls more than 89,000 students, of which more than 74,000 are undergraduates and more than 14,000 are postgraduates. In addition to its land-grant designation, the university is a sea-grant, space-grant, and sun-grant university. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity" and is a member of the Association of American Universities (AAU). The university has two law schools: Penn State Law on the school's University Park campus and Penn State Dickinson Law in Carlisle. The College of Medicine is in Hershey. The university maintains 19 commonwealth campuses and 5 special mission campuses located across Pennsylvania.
Most of its athletic teams, known collectively as the Penn State Nittany Lions, compete in the Big Ten Conference in Division I of the NCAA. Since its founding, Penn State has won 82 national collegiate team championships, including 54 NCAA titles across all sports, and Penn State students, alumni, faculty, and coaches have won a total of 74 Olympic medals, including 20 gold medals.
History
19th century
Pennsylvania State University was founded in 1855 when James Irvin, a U.S. congressman from Bellefonte, donated 200 acres (0.8 km2) of land in Centre County to the newly-established Farmers' High School of Pennsylvania, representing the first of 10,101 acres (41 km2) the school eventually acquired.
The same year, on February 22, the Pennsylvania General Assembly designated the school a degree-granting institution. Initially sponsored by the Pennsylvania State Agricultural Society, the use of "college" or "university" was avoided in the school's naming since local Pennsylvanians perceived that such institutions were impractical in their curricula.
In 1862, the school's name was changed to the Agricultural College of Pennsylvania. The following year, in 1863, the Morrill Land-Grant Acts was passed by the U.S. Congress, and Pennsylvania selected the school to be the state's sole land-grant college. Two years later, in 1874, the school's name was changed to the Pennsylvania State College.
By 1875, enrollment fell to 64 undergraduates, and the school attempted to balance its primary focus on agricultural studies with classic education. In 1882, George W. Atherton was named the school's president; Atherton set about broadening the curriculum beyond its agricultural focus.
The school developed an engineering studies program that immediately became one of the nation's ten largest engineering schools.
A major road in State College was later named in Atherton's honor. Penn State's Atherton Hall, a well-furnished and centrally located residence hall, was named after George Atherton's wife, Frances Washburn Atherton.
20th century
In the 20th century, Penn State grew significantly, becoming the largest grantor of baccalaureate degrees in Pennsylvania. In 1936, its enrollment reached 5,000. Around this time, Ralph D. Hetzel, the school's president, established a commonwealth of colleges to provide an alternative for Depression-era students who were economically unable to leave home to attend college.
In 1953, President Milton S. Eisenhower, the brother of then-U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, sought and won permission to elevate the school to university status, and it assumed its current name, The Pennsylvania State University. Under Eisenhower's successor, Eric A. Walker, the university acquired hundreds of acres of surrounding land, and enrollment nearly tripled.
In 1967, the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, a college of medicine and hospital, was established in Hershey with a $50 million gift from the Hershey Trust Company.
In 1970s, the university became a state-related institution, leading to its membership in the Commonwealth System of Higher Education. In 1975, the lyrics in the Penn State Alma Mater were revised to be gender-neutral in honor of International Women's Year; the revised lyrics were taken from the posthumously published autobiography of the writer of the original lyrics, Fred Lewis Pattee. Professor Patricia Farrell acted as a spokesperson for those who wanted the change.
In 1989, the Pennsylvania College of Technology in Williamsport became affiliated with the university.
21st century
In 2000, Dickinson School of Law joined the Pennsylvania College of Technology in affiliating with the university. The university is now the largest in Pennsylvania, and in 2003, it was credited with having the second-largest impact on the state economy of any organization, generating an economic effect of over $17 billion on a budget of $2.5 billion. To offset the lack of funding due to the limited growth in state appropriations to Penn State, the university has concentrated its efforts on philanthropy (2003 marked the end of the Grand Destiny campaign—a seven-year effort that raised over $1.3 billion).
Child sex abuse scandal
In 2011, the university and its football program garnered international media attention and criticism in a sex abuse scandal in which university officials were alleged to have covered up incidents of child sexual abuse by former football team defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky. Athletic director Timothy Curley and Gary Schultz, senior vice president for finance and business, were indicted for perjury. In the wake of the scandal, Coach Joe Paterno was fired and school president Graham B. Spanier was forced to resign by the board of trustees. Sandusky, who maintained his innocence, was indicted and subsequently convicted in June 2012 on 45 counts for the abuse.
A subcommittee of the board of trustees engaged former FBI director Louis Freeh to head an independent investigation on the university's handling of the incidents. Freeh released his findings in July 2012 in which he claimed that Paterno, Spanier, Curley, and Schultz "conceal[ed] Sandusky's activities from the board of trustees, the university community and authorities" and "failed to protect against a child sexual predator harming children for over a decade". Subsequently, the National Collegiate Athletic Association levied sanctions against Penn State for its role in the scandal, penalizing the Penn State football program with a $60 million fine, a ban from bowl games and post-season play for four years, a reduction in its scholarships from 25 to 15 annually for four years, the vacating of all Penn State football wins from 1998 to 2011, and a five-year probationary period.
Following imposition of the NCAA sanctions, emails surfaced indicating that high-level NCAA officials did not believe they had the jurisdiction to pass down the original sanctions. Subsequent emails, brought forward under subpoena, quoted an NCAA vice president, who wrote, "I characterized our approach to PSU as a bluff when talking to Mark [Emmert, NCAA president]...He basically agreed [because] I think he understands that if we made this an enforcement issue, we may win the immediate battle but lose the war."
On September 8, 2014, following a report by former U.S. senator and athletics integrity monitor George J. Mitchell citing progress by Penn State in implementing reforms, the NCAA repealed the sanctions. On January 16, 2015, all previous Penn State football records were restored.
An investigation led by former U.S. attorney general Richard Thornburgh, who the Paterno family retained to review the Freeh report, alleged that the report that placed so much blame on Penn State and Paterno was a "rush to injustice" that could not be relied upon. He found that not only did the evidence "fall far short" of showing Paterno attempted to conceal the Sandusky scandal, but rather that "the contrary is true". In November 2014, Pennsylvania state senator Jake Corman released further emails that he claimed showed "regular and substantive" contact between NCAA officials and Freeh's investigators, suggesting that Freeh's conclusions were orchestrated.
Death of Timothy Piazza
On February 2, 2017, Timothy Piazza, a pledge of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity located off-campus in State College, died while undergoing hazing activities at the fraternity. Eighteen members of Penn State's Beta Theta Pi fraternity were initially charged in connection with Piazza's death, and the fraternity was closed and banned indefinitely. In July 2024, the fraternity president and vice president and pledge master each pleaded guilty to 14 misdemeanor counts of hazing and a misdemeanor count of recklessly endangering another person.
Campuses
University Park
The largest of the university's 24 campuses, Penn State University Park is located in State College and College Township in Centre County, in central Pennsylvania. Its dedicated ZIP Code is 16802. With an undergraduate acceptance rate of 49 percent, it is the most selective campus in the Penn State system. The university ranks among the most selective schools in Pennsylvania, according to various publications. During the fall 2018 semester, 40,363 undergraduate students and 5,907 graduate students were enrolled at University Park. Of those, 46.5 percent were female and 42.4 percent were non-Pennsylvania residents.
The University Park campus is centrally located at the junction of Interstate 99/U.S. Route 220 and U.S. Route 322, and is due south of Interstate 80. Before the arrival of the Interstates, University Park was a short distance from the Lock Haven–Altoona branch line of the Pennsylvania Railroad. The last run of long-distance trains from Buffalo or Harrisburg through Lock Haven was in 1971. Today, the nearest Amtrak passenger rail access is in Tyrone, 25 miles to the southwest. Intercity bus service to University Park is provided by Fullington Trailways, Greyhound Lines, Megabus, and OurBus. The State College Regional Airport, serving two regional airlines, is near University Park.
Commonwealth campuses
In addition to the University Park campus, 19 campus locations throughout the commonwealth of Pennsylvania offer enrollment for undergraduate students. Over 60 percent of Penn State first-year students begin their education at a location other than University Park. Each of the 19 commonwealth campuses offer a unique set of degree programs based on the student demographics. Any student in good academic standing is guaranteed a spot at University Park to finish their degree if required or desired, known as "change of campus" or, more accurately, "the 2+2 program"; where a Penn State student may start at any Penn State campus, including University Park, for two years and finish at any Penn State the final two years.
Seven of the 19 commonwealth campuses are slated to close by the end of the 2027 academic year due to enrollment declines and financial pressure.
Special mission campuses and World Campus
Special mission campuses
Dickinson Law, founded in 1834 as The Dickinson School of Law in Carlisle, is the oldest law school in Pennsylvania and the fifth-oldest in the country. Since its founding, its graduates have included several notable attorneys, judges, government and corporate leaders, and legal educators. Dickinson School of Law's 1997 merger with Penn State was completed in 2000. It expanded its reputation, network, and joint degree programs complementing Dickinson Law's legacy as an innovative leader in experiential education. In 2006, a second law campus was opened at University Park. In 2014, the law school was split into two separately accredited law schools: Dickinson Law in Carlisle and Penn State Law in University Park. The last students to attend the dual-campus Penn State Dickinson School of Law graduated in May 2017.
Penn State Great Valley School of Graduate Professional Studies in Malvern, is a special mission campus offering master's degrees, graduate certification, and continuing professional education. It also offers classes at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard.
Penn State University College of Medicine in Hershey, is the university's medical school and teaching hospital. Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center became the ninth hospital in the United States and 16th worldwide to implant the CardioWest temporary Total Artificial Heart when a 60-year-old man suffering from end-stage heart failure received the device in May 2008.
Pennsylvania College of Technology, in Williamsport, which became an affiliate of the university in 1989, offers degrees and certificates in over ten technical fields.
World Campus
In 1998, the university launched Penn State World Campus, or Penn State Online, which offers more than 60 online education programs, degrees, and certificates. Distance education has a long history at Penn State, one of the first universities in the country to offer a correspondence course for remote farmers in 1892. Examples of online programs include an MBA, a master of professional studies in homeland security, a Bachelor of Science in nursing, and post-baccalaureate certificates in geographic information systems and applied behavior analysis.
Organization and administration
Penn State is a state-related university and a member of Pennsylvania's Commonwealth System of Higher Education. While it receives funding from the Commonwealth and is connected to the state through its board of trustees, however, it is otherwise independent and not subject to any direct control by the state. For the 2006–2007 fiscal year, the university received 9.7 percent of its budget from state appropriations, the lowest of the four state-related institutions in Pennsylvania.
Colleges
Penn State has eighteen colleges, including three at special-mission campuses. The University Park campus is organized into fourteen distinct colleges, plus the graduate school and the division of undergraduate studies:
The university's board of trustees voted in January 2007 to create a school of international affairs, with the first classes admitted in the fall 2008 semester. The school is part of Penn State Law.
Formerly the school of nursing, on September 25, 2013, the board of trustees granted the nursing program college status.
Board of trustees
The 32-member board of trustees governs the university. Its members include the university's president, the Governor of the Commonwealth, and the state Secretaries of Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources, and Education. The other members include six trustees appointed by the Governor, nine elected by alumni, and six elected by Pennsylvania agricultural societies. Six additional trustees are elected by a board representing business and industry enterprises. Undergraduate students do not elect any trustees; the court case Benner v. Oswald ruled that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment did not require the undergraduate students be allowed to participate in the selection of trustees.
As of 2026, the chair of the board of trustees is David M. Kleppinger, a graduate of Penn State and chairman emeritus at McNees Wallace & Nurick LLC.
The board's main responsibilities are to select the president of Penn State, determine the goals and strategic direction of the university, and approve the annual budget. Regular meetings of the board are held bi-monthly and take place primarily on the University Park campus, although on occasion meetings are held at other locations within the Commonwealth.
Administration
The university president is selected by the board and is given the authority for actual control of the university, including day-to-day management. In practice, part of this responsibility is delegated by the president to other administrative departments, the faculty, and the student body. Neeli Bendapudi became the university's 19th and current president on May 9, 2022, upon the departure of Eric J. Barron. The executive vice president and provost is the chief academic officer of the university. The current provost, Fotis Sotiropoulos, assumed the office on August 11, 2025.
Student government
Penn State has a long history of student governance. Elected student leaders remain directly involved in the decision-making of the university administration, as provided for in the board of trustees' standing orders. There are four student governments recognized by the university administration: the University Park Undergraduate Association (UPUA), the Graduate and Professional Student Association (GPSA), the Council of Commonwealth Student Governments (CCSG), and the World Campus Student Government Association (WCSGA).
The University Park Undergraduate Association (UPUA) is the representative student government of the undergraduate students at Penn State's University Park campus, which was established in 2006 after the former student government, Undergraduate Student Government (USG), lost its recognition by way of a student referendum. Graduate and professional students at the university are represented by the Graduate and Professional Student Association (GPSA), the oldest continuously existing student governance organization at Penn State.
The 19 commonwealth campuses of the university are governed by the Council of Commonwealth Student Governments (CCSG), formerly known as the Council of Branch Campus Student Governments (CBCSG).
In 2019, the World Campus Student Government Association (WCSGA) was formed to advocate for the interests and concerns of the more than 20,000 Penn State World Campus students.
Academics
Undergraduate admissions
Admission to Penn State University Park is classified as "selective" by the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. The Princeton Review gives Penn State University Park an "Admissions Selectivity Rating" of 90 out of 99.