Dakota State University Overview

Located in Madison, South Dakota, Dakota State University is a public institution. Madison is a good match for students who enjoy small-town life.

What Is Dakota State University Known For?

• The doctor's degree is the highest award offered at Dakota State.
• For the 2017-2018 academic year, 70% of the faculty were full-time.

Dakota State University Rankings

We have ranked Dakota State as #428 out of 2,320 colleges and universities in the country in our 2021 Best Colleges list.

These rankings may look different from those published by other outlets, because we use an outcomes-based approach rather than a subjective one. We get our data from a number of places, including the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) and the College Scorecard. For more information, check out our rankings and methodology page.

Program Level Awards

These are highlights of some of the most noteworthy awards granted to specific programs at Dakota State.

Rank	Ranking Name	Share
#1	Most Popular Online Information Science Doctor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#1	Best Information Technology Doctor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#13	Most Popular Online Information Technology Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#14	Best Special Education Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#27	Best Instructional Media Design Master’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#39	Most Popular Online Computer & Information Sciences Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#48	Best Teacher Education Grade Specific Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#48	Best Education Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It
#64	Best Business Administration & Management Associate’s Degree Schools	Tweet It - Post It

Awards From Around the Web

The following table lists some notable awards Dakota State has earned from around the web.

Rank	Ranking Name	Source
#2	Best Value Colleges for Information Technology	College Factual
#3	Best Value Colleges for Computer & Information Sciences	College Factual
#4	Best Information Technology Colleges for Veterans	College Factual
#20	Best Computer & Information Sciences Colleges for Veterans	College Factual
#23	Best Value Colleges for Computer Information Systems	College Factual
#48	Best Teaching Bachelor’s Degree Schools	Teaching Degree Search

Where Is Dakota State University?

Contact details for Dakota State are given below.

	Contact Details
Address:	820 N Washington Ave, Madison, SD 57042-1799
Phone:	605-256-5111
Website:	https://dsu.edu
Twitter:	http://twitter.com/DakotaState

How Do I Get Into Dakota State?

You can apply to Dakota State online at: https://dsu.edu/admissions/apply-now

Admission Requirements for Dakota State

Submission	Required?
High School GPA	required
High School Rank	required
High School Transcript	required
College Prep Program	neither required nor recommended
Recommendations	neither required nor recommended
SAT or ACT Scores	required
TOEFL	required

How Hard Is It To Get Into Dakota State?

Dakota State has an acceptance rate of 84%, which means that is not quite as selective as some other schools. Still, you'll need good grades and a solid application if you want to be admitted.

Approximately 67% of accepted students are men and 33% are women. The acceptance rate for men is 86%, and the acceptance rate for women is 82%.

Average Test Scores

About 6% of students accepted to Dakota State submitted their SAT scores. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing scores ranged between 490 and 620. Math scores were between 460 and 620.

Dakota State received ACT scores from 93% of accepted students. When looking at the 25th through the 75th percentile, ACT English scores ranged between 18 and 25. Math scores were between 18 and 26. Composite scores were between 19 and 26.

Can I Afford Dakota State University?

The overall average net price of Dakota State is $23,180. The affordability of the school largely depends on your financial need since net price varies by income group.

The net price is calculated by adding tuition, room, board and other costs and subtracting financial aid.

Student Loan Debt

While almost two-thirds of students nationwide take out loans to pay for college, the percentage may be quite different for the school you plan on attending. At Dakota State, approximately 74% of students took out student loans averaging $7,401 a year. That adds up to $29,604 over four years for those students.

The student loan default rate at Dakota State is 7.4%. Although this is lower than the national default rate of 10.1%, you'll still want to keep this in mind when taking out student loans.

Dakota State University Undergraduate Student Diversity

There are 2,993 undergraduate students at Dakota State, with 1,448 being full-time and 1,545 being part-time.

There are also 389 graduate students at the school.

Gender Diversity

Of the 1,448 full-time undergraduates at Dakota State, 69% are male and 31% are female.

Racial-Ethnic Diversity

The racial-ethnic breakdown of Dakota State University students is as follows.

Race/Ethnicity	Number of Grads
Asian	23
Black or African American	29
Hispanic or Latino	63
White	1,240
International Students	27
Other Races/Ethnicities	66

Geographic Diversity

South Dakota students aren't the only ones who study at Dakota State University. At this time, 22 states are represented by the student population at the school.

Over 25 countries are represented at Dakota State. The most popular countries sending students to the school are India, Nepal, and Nigeria.

Online Learning at Dakota State University

There are 13 bachelor’s degree and 6 master’s degree programs available online at Dakota State. In 2017-2018, 2,191 students took at least one online class at the school.

The following chart shows how the online learning population at Dakota State has changed over the last few years.

This school is the 3rd most popular in South Dakota for online learning according to the online graduations recorded by the Department of Education for the academic year 2017-2018.

Online Growth Rankings of Dakota State

The average growth rate over the last four years of online students at Dakota State University was 11.1%. This is the #1,260 largest growth rate of all schools that are only partially online. This refers to all students at Dakota State regardless of major.

The following table shows the 1-year growth rate of Dakota State majors that offer at least one online course. This table only includes majors with positive growth.

Major	1-Year Growth Rate
Business Administration & Management	50%
Business, Management & Marketing	21%
Education	22%
Information Science	5%
Information Technology	7%
Liberal Arts / Sciences & Humanities	12%
Liberal Arts General Studies	12%
Marketing	43%
Mathematics & Statistics	55%
Medical Illustration & Informatics	80%
Special Education	24%
Teacher Education Grade Specific	50%

The table below shows how the average growth rate over 4 years at Dakota State ranks compared to all other partially online schools that offer a specific major. Note that the majors may or may not be offered online at Dakota State.

Major	Growth Rate Rank
Medical Illustration & Informatics	#15
Computer Software & Applications	#23
Information Science	#25
Marketing	#56
Information Technology	#57
Instructional Media Design	#68
Computer Information Systems	#81
Special Education	#88
Accounting	#115
Health & Medical Administrative Services	#161
Computer & Information Sciences	#176
Liberal Arts General Studies	#209
Liberal Arts / Sciences & Humanities	#209
Education	#338
Business Administration & Management	#410
Health Professions	#440

When we speak of partially online, we are referring to schools whose online population is less than 50% of its total student body. Mostly online refers to those with online populations greater than or equal to 50%.

Dakota State University Undergraduate Concentrations

The table below shows the number of awards for each concentration.

Major	Basic Certificate	Associate’s	Undergraduate Certificate	Bachelor’s	Graduate Certificate	Master’s	Doctor’s	TOTAL
Information Technology	2	10	0	76	0	12	7	107
Computer Information Systems	6	0	0	48	0	32	0	86
Information Science	0	10	0	17	18	16	4	65
Business Administration & Management	0	14	0	15	0	9	0	38
Liberal Arts General Studies	0	5	0	19	0	0	0	24
Teacher Education Grade Specific	0	0	0	22	0	0	0	22
Special Education	0	0	0	21	0	0	0	21
Health & Medical Administrative Services	0	9	2	10	0	0	0	21
Computer Software & Applications	1	0	0	17	0	0	0	18
Statistics	0	0	0	11	0	0	0	11
Allied Health Professions	0	8	0	2	0	0	0	10
Accounting	0	0	0	9	0	0	0	9
Teacher Education Subject Specific	0	0	0	9	0	0	0	9
Design & Applied Arts	0	0	0	8	0	0	0	8
Marketing	0	0	0	7	0	0	0	7
Instructional Media Design	0	0	0	0	0	6	0	6
Biological & Biomedical Sciences (Other)	0	0	0	5	0	0	0	5
Medical Illustration & Informatics	0	0	0	0	0	5	0	5
English Literature (Other)	0	0	0	4	0	0	0	4
Health & Physical Education	0	0	0	3	0	0	0	3
Finance & Financial Management	0	0	0	2	0	0	0	2
General Physical Sciences	0	0	0	2	0	0	0	2
Computer Systems Networking	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	1
Writing Studies	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Mathematics	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Intelligence & Command Control Operations	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
TOTAL	10	56	2	307	18	80	11	484

References

*The racial-ethnic minorities count is calculated by taking the total number of students and subtracting white students, international students, and students whose race/ethnicity was unknown. This number is then divided by the total number of students at the school to obtain the racial-ethnic minorities percentage.

• College Factual
• National Center for Education Statistics
• Image Credit: By Jlgrabinger under License

More about our data sources and methodologies.