by our College Data Analytics TeamTake a look at the classes and faculty information below to get a feel for student life at USD.
On this page you’ll find:
The student to faculty ratio at University of South Dakota is about average at 14 to 1. This ratio is often used to gauge how much time professors will have to spend with their students on an individual level. The national average for this metric is 15 to 1.
The following table shows all the employees the school considers instructional, and therefore, part of the above student-to-faculty ratio. These include both those employees designated as either “primarily instructional” or as “instructional combined with research/public service”. It does not include employees that have been identified by University of South Dakota as primarily performing research or public service.
| Total | Full Time | Part Time | Percent Full Time | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total of Instructional Employees | 678 | 416 | 262 | 61% |
| Total of Those With Faculty Status | 678 | 416 | 262 | 61% |
| Tenured Faculty | 150 | 144 | 6 | 96% |
| On Tenure Track | 81 | 80 | 1 | 99% |
| Not on Tenure Track | 447 | 192 | 255 | 43% |
| Without Faculty Status | - | - | - | - |
| Graduate Assistants | 316 | - | 316 | - |
At University of South Dakota, 61% of instructors are employed full time, which ranks among the highest in the nation.
At University of South Dakota, 39% of the teaching staff are part-time non-faculty or non-tenure track faculty. This is a bit below the national average of 51.4%.
Colleges often use part-time professors and adjuncts to teach courses, rather than full-time faculty. This hiring practice is primarily a way to save money amid increasingly tight budgets. However, it is a controversial practice with strong views on either side. We encourage you to understand this topic more deeply, and how the colleges you are interested in approach faculty hiring.
University of South Dakota has 181 instructional graduate assistants that teach or provide teaching-related duties. These responsibilities could range from entirely teaching lower-level courses themselves, to assisting professors by developing teaching materials, preparing or giving exams and grading student work. We suggest you ask the college to what extent graduate assistants are relied on for instruction, so you know what you are paying for. Additionally, the school has 135 non-instructional graduate assistants.