Shawnee State University Admission
Shawnee State University Undergraduate Program
Shawnee State University Application

The Facts

Shawnee State University is a rather moderately sized, public institution located in the town of Portsmouth, Ohio, and is home to over 3,000 undergraduate students and approximately 650 part-time students. (There are no graduate programs.) The university is divided up into several different programs, including schools in the areas of the arts and sciences, business, engineering, health sciences, and education. These programs offer majors in the broad areas of biological science, business, communications and the arts, computer and physical science, education, engineering and environmental design, (including an innovative plastics technology major) health professions, as well as the social sciences. Shawnee State University offers its students a fairly wide range of majors in both the liberal arts, and preprofessional studies, however, some of the most popular with students include majors in the areas of engineering technology, early childhood education, psychology, pre medicine, and business administration.

Admission to Shawnee State University is not competitive in any capacity; in fact, every single student that applied last year was admitted. Last admissions cycle, over 2,300 students applied, and every single one was admitted to the school. Eventually however, only about 850 of the admitted students actually enrolled for the coming Fall semester. The admitted students had an average combined SAT score ranging from 980 to 1010, and an average comprehensive ACT score ranging from 18 to 25. Additionally, more than 35% of the admitted students were ranked in the top 25% of their high school graduating class with an average high school GPA of about a 3.32.

Shawnee State University has a fairly manageable student to faculty ratio of 24:1, however, there are other state schools of comparable size that manage to keep their ratio significantly lower. Most of the introductory and general education classes are held in large lecture halls, however, the upper level and more specifically oriented class are much smaller; in fact, it is quite rare to find one of these upper level classes with more than 25 students. Upperclassmen in particular get plenty of opportunities to work one on one with their professors on various projects and research, and one of the best aspects of the university for students is the professors. Students give them extremely high marks in terms of accessibility and willingness to help outside of class time.

The Social Scene

The town of Portsmouth is quite small, and doesn’t really offer students much in the way of entertainment, however, the rather sizable city of Columbus, Ohio is only about 90 miles South. In fact, many students own cars, and make the city a weekend mini-road trip destination. There are 5 national fraternities and sororities at the school, and over 8% of the student body belongs to a Greek organization of some sort. The Greeks basically run the on campus social life, and their biweekly parties are the highlights of the week for many students. Drinking is probably the most popular mode of social interaction, but there are plenty of student clubs and organizations to get involved in if binge drinking the weekend away really isn’t your thing.

The dating scene has many attractive pickings, however, don’t expect any sophisticated romance to blossom amidst all the crazy weekend partying...

What’s Good

“The professors are really dedicated to the school. You don’t get the feeling that they’re always running off to be somewhere else.”

“The party scene is amazing here. If it didn’t exist, there really would be nothing to do besides study.”

“The campus life office does a really great job of keeping us occupied. I can’t remember a time when I was bored.”

What’s Bad

“There is absolutely nothing to do in Portsmouth. If you don’t have a car to get to Columbus, you can kiss urban life goodbye for the next four years.”

“All the partying gets pretty old and obnoxious after awhile. You just want some peace and quiet from time to time.”

“The Greeks think they own the campus, and unfortunately, they basically do.”

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