When students are choosing which college to attend each year, there are two statistics that generally end up playing a pretty big role: How big is the school and how big are the classes?
Most students have some idea of the size of campus they’re looking for–either the large, university experience at a big state school, the small and intimate nature of a school with just a few hundred students, or somewhere in between–a good balance.
One thing that many students struggle with when considering large colleges is the class size–will I just be another name on an attendance sheet or will I actually know my professors?
For many colleges, the relative class size is measured by looking at the total number of students versus the total number of faculty at the college–the student to faculty ratio. While this measure won’t necessarily equal the size of every class, it’s a good benchmark for measuring how much access students might have for time with professors and other teaching staff.
And many students are looking to balance a large college with many social and professional opportunities with a more personal learning experience.
That’s why we created this list.
Our Big School & Small Class Sizes list allows students to see colleges that enroll more than 10,000 undergraduates, but also have a student-to-faculty ratio of 15:1 or better. It’s a pretty small set of schools that meet these criteria, but there are actually quite a few to choose from–nearly 50 in total.
Check out the colleges that made the list!
| College | Student / Faculty Ratio | Undergraduate Students | |
|---|---|---|---|
| University of Pennsylvania | 6:1 | 11,548 | Learn more |
| Harvard University | 8:1 | 10,338 | Learn more |
| University of Southern California | 9:1 | 18,739 | Learn more |
| Cornell University | 9:1 | 14,282 | Learn more |
| New York University | 10:1 | 24,985 | Learn more |
| Drexel University | 10:1 | 16,896 | Learn more |
| CUNY City College | 11:1 | 12,893 | Learn more |
| CUNY Hunter College | 11:1 | 16,879 | Learn more |
| Madison Area Technical College | 11:1 | 16,698 | Learn more |
| George Washington University | 12:1 | 10,740 | Learn more |
| Keiser University-Ft Lauderdale | 12:1 | 18,101 | Learn more |
| University of Miami | 12:1 | 11,175 | Learn more |
| University of Louisville | 12:1 | 15,961 | Learn more |
| University of Michigan-Ann Arbor | 12:1 | 28,395 | Learn more |
| Saint Louis University | 12:1 | 12,374 | Learn more |
| Purdue University-Main Campus | 12:1 | 30,237 | Learn more |
| University of Hawaii at Manoa | 13:1 | 14,126 | Learn more |
| Boston University | 13:1 | 18,017 | Learn more |
| Rochester Institute of Technology | 13:1 | 13,460 | Learn more |
| University at Buffalo | 13:1 | 19,882 | Learn more |
| University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | 13:1 | 18,350 | Learn more |
| Loyola University Chicago | 14:1 | 10,322 | Learn more |
| Northeastern University | 14:1 | 13,510 | Learn more |
| University of Missouri-Kansas City | 14:1 | 10,453 | Learn more |
| CUNY Brooklyn College | 14:1 | 14,115 | Learn more |
| CUNY Lehman College | 14:1 | 10,326 | Learn more |
| CUNY Queens College | 14:1 | 15,773 | Learn more |
| University of Pittsburgh-Pittsburgh Campus | 14:1 | 18,757 | Learn more |
| Temple University | 14:1 | 28,287 | Learn more |
| University of Memphis | 14:1 | 17,073 | Learn more |
| Troy University | 15:1 | 15,114 | Learn more |
| University of Delaware | 15:1 | 18,951 | Learn more |
| Saint Leo University | 15:1 | 12,581 | Learn more |
| Northern Illinois University | 15:1 | 15,435 | Learn more |
| Southern Illinois University-Carbondale | 15:1 | 13,461 | Learn more |
| Ball State University | 15:1 | 16,415 | Learn more |
| Eastern Kentucky University | 15:1 | 13,939 | Learn more |
| Wayne State University | 15:1 | 18,347 | Learn more |
| Thomas Edison State College | 15:1 | 20,143 | Learn more |
| SUNY Empire State College | 15:1 | 10,873 | Learn more |
| Excelsior College | 15:1 | 38,426 | Learn more |
| Youngstown State University | 15:1 | 11,267 | Learn more |
| College of Charleston | 15:1 | 10,440 | Learn more |
| Baylor University | 15:1 | 13,859 | Learn more |
| University of Vermont | 15:1 | 10,992 | Learn more |
| University of Virginia-Main Campus | 15:1 | 16,483 | Learn more |
| Washington State University | 15:1 | 23,867 | Learn more |
| University of Wyoming | 15:1 | 10,124 | Learn more |
