Duke University
Durham, NC 27708
www.duke.edu

Duke University is a private research university located in Durham, North Carolina, United States. The University is organized into two undergraduate and nine graduate schools. The undergraduate student body comes from all 50 U.S. states and 106 countries. In its 2009 edition, U.S. News & World Report ranked the university's undergraduate program 8th among national universities, while ranking the medical, law, and business schools among the top 12 in the country. Duke University ranked 13th in the 2008 THES - QS World University Rankings.

Duke's research expenditures are among the largest 20 in the U.S

Academics

Duke's student body consists of 6,340 undergraduates and 7,117 graduate and professional students (as of Fall 2008). The undergraduate student body, containing 40% ethnic minorities, come from all 50 U.S. states and 106 countries (as of 2007-08). For the undergraduate class of 2012, Duke received 20,400 applications, and accepted 20.5% of them. For the class of 2012, 96% of admitted students ranked in the top 10% of their high school class. The middle 50% range of SAT scores for first-year students is 1340-1540 (old scale) or 2020-2320 (new scale), while the ACT range is 29-34. In 2007 the School of Medicine received 5,076 applicants for 100 spots (2.0% of applicants), while the average GPA and MCAT scores for accepted students were 3.88 and 36, respectively. The School of Law accepted approximately 21% of its applicants for the class of 2010, while enrolling students had a median GPA of 3.74 and median LSAT of 169.

Duke University has two schools for undergraduates: Trinity College of Arts and Sciences and Pratt School of Engineering. The University's graduate and professional schools include the Graduate School, the Pratt School of Engineering, the Nicholas School of the Environment, the School of Medicine, the School of Nursing, the Fuqua School of Business, the School of Law, the Divinity School, and the Sanford School of Public Policy.

In the past decade, Duke has had the sixth highest number of Fulbright, Rhodes, Truman, and Goldwater scholarships in the nation among private universities. The University practices need-blind admissions and meets 100% of admitted students' demonstrated need. More than 40% of students in 2007–08 received financial aid, with the average grant being $26,700. Roughly 60 merit-based scholarships are also offered, many of which are geared toward students in North Carolina, African-American students, and high achieving students requiring financial aid.

Undergraduate

Duke offers 36 arts and sciences majors, four engineering majors, and 46 additional majors that have been approved under Program II, which allows students to design their own interdisciplinary major. Sixteen certificate programs also are available. Students may pursue a combination of a total of up to three majors/minors/certificates. Eighty percent of undergraduates enroll in the Trinity College of Arts and Sciences, while the rest are in the Pratt School of Engineering.

Trinity's curriculum operates under the revised version of "Curriculum 2000." It ensures that students are exposed to a variety of "areas of knowledge" and "modes of inquiry." The curriculum aims to help students develop critical faculties and judgment by learning how to access, synthesize, and communicate knowledge effectively, acquiring perspective on current and historical events, conducting research and solving problems, and developing tenacity and a capacity for hard and sustained work. In addition, freshmen can elect to participate in the FOCUS Program, which allows students to engage in an interdisciplinary exploration of a specific topic in a small group setting.

Pratt's curriculum, on the other hand, is narrower in scope, but still accommodates double majors in a variety of disciplines. The school emphasizes undergraduate research—opportunities for hands-on experiences arise through internships, fellowship programs, and the structured curriculum. Furthermore, for the class of 2007, more than 27% of Pratt undergraduates studied abroad, small compared to the percentage for Trinity undergraduates (46%), but much larger than the national average for engineering students (1.5%).

Research

Duke University’s research expenditures topped $490 million in 2004. In the 2005 fiscal year, Duke University Medical Center received the fifth-largest amount of funding from the National Institute of Health, netting $349.8 million. Duke's funding increased 14.8% from 2004, representing the largest growth of any top-20 recipient. In the 2008 fiscal year, Duke University School of Nursing jumped to 18th nationally in the rankings of the National Institute of Health funding for nursing schools, netting more than $2.34 million, up 54 percent from 2007, when it ranked 30th nationally.

Throughout history, Duke researchers have made breakthroughs, including the biomedical engineering department's development of the world's first real-time, three-dimensional ultrasound diagnostic system and the first engineered blood vessels. In the mechanical engineering department, Adrian Bejan developed the constructal theory, which explains the shapes that arise in nature. Duke has also pioneered studies involving nonlinear dynamics, chaos, and complex systems in physics. In May 2006, Duke researchers mapped the final human chromosome, which made world news as the Human Genome Project was finally complete. Reports of Duke researchers' involvement in new AIDS vaccine research surfaced in June 2006. The biology department combines two historically strong programs in botany and zoology, while the divinity school's leading theologian is Time's 2001 "America's Best Theologian," Stanley Hauerwas. The graduate program in literature boasts several internationally renowned figures, including Fredric Jameson, Michael Hardt, and Alice Kaplan, while philosophers Robert Brandon and Lakatos Award-winner Alexander Rosenberg make Duke a leading center for research in philosophy of biology.

Rankings

In the 2010 U.S. News & World Report ranking of undergraduate programs at doctoral granting institutions, Duke ranked 10th. In the past decade, U.S. News & World Report has placed Duke as high as 3rd and as low as 10th. Duke was ranked the 13th-best university in the world in 2007 by the THES - QS World University Rankings. Duke was ranked 32nd best globally and 25th nationally by Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 2008, focusing on quality of scientific research and number of Nobel Prizes. The Wall Street Journal ranked Duke 6th (5th among universities) in its "feeder" rankings in 2006, analyzing the percentage of undergraduates that enroll in what it considers the top 5 medical, law, and business schools. A survey by the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education in 2002 ranked Duke as the best university in the country in regard to the integration of African American students and faculty.

In U.S. News & World Report 's "America's Best Graduate Schools 2009," Duke's medical school ranked 6th for research and tied for 41st for primary care, while the law school ranked 10th. In the U.S. News & World Report 's most recent rankings of nursing schools, in 2007, Duke's nursing school tied for 15th. Among business schools in the United States, the Fuqua School of Business was ranked 12th by U.S. News & World Report in 2009 and 8th by BusinessWeek in 2008. The graduate program for the Pratt School of Engineering was ranked 30th by U.S. News & World Report and 2nd by The Princeton Review in 2006 among national engineering schools. In the rankings of doctoral programs by U.S. News & World Report in its 2008 edition, Duke ranked 1st in literary criticism and theory, 5th in ecology and evolutionary biology, 5th in biomedical engineering, tied for 12th for doctoral programs in the sciences, tied for 21st in mathematics, tied for 25th in computer science, tied for 29th in physics, and ranked 38th in chemistry.

Political science, sociology, history, economics, and cultural anthropology departments also frequently rank in the top 20 of their respective disciplines among U.S. universities. The Philosophical Gourmet Report placed Duke's philosophy program as the 27th best in the nation in 2006, while ranking Duke as the best program in the U.S. in philosophy of biology.

Campus

Duke University owns 220 buildings on 8,610 acres (35 km²) of land, which includes the 7,200 acre (29 km²) Duke Forest. The campus is divided into four main areas: West, East, and Central campuses, and the Medical Center. All the campuses are connected via a free bus service that runs frequently throughout the week. On the Atlantic coast in Beaufort, Duke owns 15 acres (61,000 m2) as part of its Marine Lab. One of the major public attractions on the Duke Campus is the 55-acre (220,000 m2) Sarah P. Duke Gardens, established in the 1930s.

Libraries

With more than 5.5 million volumes, the Duke University Library System is one of the ten largest private university library systems in the U.S. and is the 30th largest of all libraries in the United States. It contains 17.7 million manuscripts, 1.2 million public documents, and tens of thousands of films and videos. Besides the main William R. Perkins Library, the university also contains the separately administered Ford (business), Divinity School, Duke Law, and Medical Center Libraries.

The William R. Perkins Library system has 9 branches on campus. In addition to Perkins Library, the system contains the Biological & Environmental Science Library, Bostock Library, the Library Service Center, Lilly Library (which houses materials on fine arts, philosophy, film & video, and performing arts), the Music Library, Pearse Memorial Library (located at the Marine Lab). The University Archives and Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections are also considered part of the Perkins Library system.

Nasher Museum of Art cost $23 million to build. Bostock Library, named for Board of Trustee member Roy J. Bostock, opened in the fall of 2005 as part of the University's strategic plan to supplement Duke's libraries. It contains 87 study carrels, 517 seats, and 96 computer stations, as well as 72,996 feet (22,249 m) of shelving for overflow books from Perkins Library as well as for new collections.

Undergraduate Programs

College of Arts & Science

Majors

African and African American Studies (bachelor of arts)
Art History (BA)
Asian & Middle Eastern Studies (BA)
Biology (BA, bachelor of science)
Canadian Studies (second major only)
Chemistry (BA, BS)
Classical Civilization (BA)
Classical Languages (BA)
Computer Science (BA, BS)
Cultural Anthropology (BA)
Dance (BA)
Earth & Ocean Sciences (BA, BS)
Economics (BA, BS)
English (BA)
Environmental Science and Policy (BA)
Environmental Sciences (BS)
Evolutionary Anthropology (BA, BS)
French Studies (BA)
German (BA)
History (BA)
Interdepartmental Major (BA, BS)
International Comparative Studies (BA)
Italian Studies (BA)
Linguistics (BA)
Literature (BA)
Mathematics (BA, BS)
Medieval & Renaissance Studies (BA)
Music (BA)
Neuroscience (BA, BS)
Philosophy (BA)
Physics (BA, BS)
Political Science (BA)
Program II  (An alternative to a major, BA, BS)
Psychology (BA, BS)
Public Policy Studies (BA)
Religion (BA)
Russian (BA)
Slavic and Eurasian Studies (BA)
Sociology (BA)
Spanish (BA)
Statistical Science (BA, BS)
Theater Studies (BA)
Visual Arts (BA)
Women's Studies (BA)

Minors

African and African American Studies
Art History
Asian & Middle Eastern Studies
Biological Anthropology and Anatomy
Biology
Canadian Studies
Chemistry
Classical Archaeology
Classical Civilization
Computational Biology and Bioinformatics
Computer Science
Cultural Anthropology
Dance
Earth and Ocean Sciences
Economics
Education
English
Environmental Science and Policy
French Studies
German
History
International Comparative Studies
Italian Studies
Latin
Linguistics
Literature
Mathematics
Medieval and Renaissance Studies
Music
Neuroscience
Philosophy
Photography
Physics
Political Science
Psychology
Religion
Russian Culture and Language
Russian Literature in Translation
Sociology
Spanish
Statistical Science
Theater Studies
Turkish Language and Culture
Visual Arts
Women's Studies
 
Certificates

Arts of the Moving Image
Children in Contemporary Society
Documentary Studies
Early Childhood Education Studies
Energy and the Environment
Genome Sciences and Policy
Global Health
Health Policy
Human Development
Information Science and Information Studies
Islamic Studies
Jewish Studies
Latin American Studies
Latino/a Studies in the Global South (LSGS)
Marine Science and Conservation Leadership
Markets and Management Studies
Modeling Biological Systems
Neuroscience
Policy Journalism and Media Studies
Politics, Philosophy, and Economics
Study of Ethics
Study of Sexualities 

College of Engineering

Biomedical Engineering

Biomechanics of blood flow, cells and hard and soft tissues
Molecular, cellular and biosurface engineering, including tissue engineering and drug delivery
Electrobiology of the heart and nervous system
Medical imaging systems and biomedical optics
and Medical informatics

Civil Engineering

Architectural engineering (Certificate Program)
Structural engineering and mechanics
Environmental engineering
Water resources and hydrology
Systems engineering and transportation

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Computer engineering and digital systems
Signal processing and communications
Solid-state devices and integrated circuits
Control systems and robotics
Electromagnetic fields
Photonics

Mechanical Engineering

Thermal and fluids systems
Mechanics and biomechanics
Dynamics, including nonlinear dynamics and control
Special attention is given to the aerospace and transportation vehicle industries

MASTERS DEGREE PROGRAMS

Biomedical Engineering
Civil and Environmental Engineering
Computer Science
Cultural Anthropology
Earth and Ocean Sciences
East Asian Studies
Economics
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Global Health
History
Humanities
International Development Policy
Liberal Studies
Master of Arts in Teaching
Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science
Medical Physics
Music
Philosophy
Political Science
Religion
Slavic and Eurasian Studies
Sociology

Tuition Fee

Undergraduate: $19,745 per semester
Graduate: $17,963 semester

Room & Board

$ 7,392 per semester