Getting To Know: Butler University (IN)-Again

Published by Stuart Nachbar at May 29, 2026

Butler University has earned high rankings.

Butler University has topped the rankings in US News for Regional Universities-Midwest since 2017-18. From 2010-11 to 2016-17 the school ranked second. Butler has also ranked at the top for Innovation and near the top for undergraduate teaching, among many other accolades. While I don’t recommend that people choose a college based on rankings in a magazine, those who choose and serve Butler might feel good about them.

Lori told me that Purdue and Indiana University-Bloomington are the most common cross apps. Butler’s undergraduate enrollment has held steady for the past six years at around 4,500 students. There are also approximately 1,300 graduate students. Between 1,100 and 1,200 freshmen entered Butler until this year. The class that entered in 2025 had just under 1,300.

Butler University is a smaller school with several majors that you’ll usually find at larger schools.

Butler has schools of arts and sciences, business, communications, education and the health professions as well a school of visual and performing arts.

Don’t know what you want to study? Butler offers Exploratory Studies options among the schools. Butler’s Core Curriculum is much like a state school, with the addition of a two-semester Freshman Seminar and a Writing Across the Disciplines requirement that I usually see at smaller liberal arts colleges.

I’m quite impressed by the selection of degree options at Butler.

It offers pathways not only to a PharmD in the health professions, but also towards becoming a Physician’s Assistant. The Lacy School of Business has one of the newest and nicest buildings to host undergraduate and graduate business programs. For those who are considering Butler vs. a larger school such as Indiana, Lacy offers a more personal, and less intimidating setting than you might find at Kelley. Aspiring physicists and others who are interested in astronomy might also want to check out Butler’s observatory, pictured below.

Butler’s approach to academics appears to be working well.

Although hurt by the pandemic, Butler has averaged 88 percent freshman retention since 2011. While Butler has students who enter as freshmen with the intention of earning an advanced degree, the four-year graduation rate has consistently exceeded 70 percent, better than most public universities, including Indiana University-Bloomington and Purdue.

The university’s location, five miles from downtown Indianapolis, adds to the educational experience.

Butler shares the city with Indiana and Purdue’s Indianapolis campuses. There’s competition for internships, but it’s not like going to college in Boston, Chicago, New York or even Columbus or Minneapolis. Bus routes and bike paths are the main ways to get downtown and the university has a partnership with Uber to help.

Indianapolis is known as the Crossroads of America. If you’re from the East Coast it’s close to the point where your clock goes an hour backwards. It’s also a major sports center as a legitimate capital of basketball in America and home to the NCAA, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the NFL’s Colts, the NFL Scouting Combine and the NBA Pacers. Butler is one of the few schools that offers a major in Sports Media as well as Creative Media and Entertainment, taking advantage of the school’s location.

Butler is not an exceptionally selective school. But it attracts very good to excellent students.

Butler accepted 82% of the students who applied to be in the 2025 freshman class While Butler is test optional, scores are considered to be Very Important, if submitted. Extracurricular achievements are considered Important. The middle 50 percent for those who submitted SART scores was between 1160 and 1330. The ACT middle 50 percent was between 26 and 31. The average high school GPA was a 3.8.

This profile is similar to a freshman class at Michigan State or the University of Iowa, even Indiana University-Bloomington (outside of the Kelley School of Business, the Nursing program or the Jacobs School of Music).

Butler has some generous scholarships, but this school can be expensive.

The university estimated a cost of attendance–direct charges and incidentals–for next year to be just over $75,000. It’s possible that scholarships can reduce costs towards non-resident charges at a Big Ten state university for the better students. However, Home State U. is quite likely to be a less expensive option.

Nearly 60% of the class that entered in 2025 received need-based scholarships that averaged over $32,000. Just over 40% received merit-based awards that averaged $28,000. However, average student loan indebtedness was high, over $40,000 because about a fifth of the Class of 2025 had to take out private loans. Graduate school debt would have affected the average if it considered those who chose an accelerated program.

Butler is not going to undercut Home State U. But it’s going to be an attractive option vs. the non-resident charges at Illinois, Indiana, Michigan or Michigan State. Interesting to me: Close to 60 percent of the undergraduate student body hails from Indiana, where in-state tuition and fees for the Big ten schools are quite reasonable compared to what flagships in Illinois,Michigan, New Jersey and Pennsylvania ask of their in-state students,

Greek life is relatively important at Butler.

It attracts a third of the undergraduate student body. Five of the six fraternities have houses as do seven of the eight sororities, and these houses look large from the outside. While two-thirds of the students are not members of Greek social organizations, and the school is in a major city with a lot to do, the Greek system is an important housing option.

Butler has required all students to live on campus for three years. Seventy percent live in university-owned residence halls or apartments. Two-thirds of the entire student body lives on campus, quite high for a university in a major city.

Butler University got on my radar because of its importance to college basketball.

Hinkle Fieldhouse, built in 1928, has been called the ‘Cathedral of Indiana Basketball.’ From 1928 to 1971 it hosted the Indiana High School Basketball Tournament, including the final scenes of the fictitious final game in Hoosiers, one of the best sports movies ever. The field house seats 9,100 and is often considered one the classic venues to watch college basketball.

From the mascot’s view, this place rocks before, during and after the game. Blue IV was one of the hardest working mascots in college basketball, but is now being retired with a sucessor on the way The game bone, which Blue rarely got to chew, is saved after every home game and auctioned for charity. Best of all, tickets are free to students, and they get really good seats.

The Butler Bulldogs got to the final game in the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championships in 2010 and 2011, losing to Duke and UConn. After a poor first season in the Big East, the Bulldogs made it back into tournament play from 2014 through 2019. Brad Stevens, who coached the Bulldogs into the National Championship games, hbecame a successful head coach with the NBA’s Boston Celtics. Former coaches Thad Matta and Chris Holtmann have succeeded at Ohio State. The current coach, Ronald Norad, comes from the pros. He was recently head coach at of the Long island Nets of the NBA’s G League.

But I can’t call Butler a ‘football school’.

Butler is D-1 in football. But football attendance averages less than one-third of what you see at a Bulldog basketball game (around 3,000/game). The university plays in the Pioneer Football League, which does not award football scholarships.. However, aside from Drake and Valparaiso, it’s hard to imagine natural rivalries in a league so spread out. The Big East has at least four Midwest rivals for basketball and other sports: Creighton, DePaul, Marquette and Xavier.

Conclusions

Through a virtual lens, and my conversations with Lori, I can see that “good things happen when you unleash a Bulldog.” If you are interested in the spirit, sports and academics found in a larger school, but prefer a far less crowded and less intimidating setting, Butler University might be your school. It is independent, mid-sized and academically comprehensive. I wish there were more colleges like this. I strongly encourage you to listen to both interviews to learn more.