What's up Youniversity TV watchers? Meet your host, Rowdie. Today he'll be showing you around his home turf, Southeast Missouri State University.

[ Background Music ]

Southeast Missouri State University is located in the traditional Midwest community of Cape Girardeau, just minutes from downtown and the legendary Mississippi River. Cape Girardeau is only two hours south of St. Louis and three hours north of Memphis and has easy access to Illinois, Kentucky, Arkansas and Tennessee.

It's a great place to be. I mean, it's -- you can't find a better location. We're right here on the Mississippi River. We're located between St. Louis and Memphis or Nashville. Those are all real close.

There are tons of things to do in Cape Girardeau. I mean, there's, you know, all kinds of like games that you can go to here. I mean, all kinds of like sporting activities from Southeast. And also just the downtown, there are all kinds of shops and it's right on the river, which is awesome. And there's bars and stuff if you're of age and there's a mall and also we have like a bowling alley. We have things to do and it's -- there's enough to do here. And you'll find that.

There is a very nice downtown area. There's also a lot of parks as well. The Trail of Tears State Park is about 15 minutes north. There's also a mall and shopping area as well.

Southeast Missouri's campus is loaded with rolling hills and an eclectic mix of old and new classic limestone buildings and contemporary structures.

The River Campus is the new campus devoted to the performing arts, which is music, theater, dance as well as liberal arts. So, some of the art studios here, right on the lovely Mississippi River. We have, just to my left is the Seminary, which is like all the classrooms and the faculty offices. And then further down is the performance venue where we have the big Bedell Theater and the Theater Department has a smaller kind of black-box theater. And we have the dance studio and all the shops, costume shops and there's art galleries.

Southeast has a total of over 10,800 students. 1.9% are international and 10% are of minority background. The average freshman class size is 25 to 30, and the student to faculty ratio is 17 to 1.

We're a moderately selective institution, so we're looking for students with a 21 on the ACT, a C average in their courses in high school as well as our 17 core curriculum requirements.

Missouri residents will pay roughly $6,500 a year in tuition, while out-of-staters will pay closer to $11,000. Tuition includes incidental fees, general fees, text book and parking fees.

With the rising costs of tuition, little bit tightening of the credit crunch, what you want to look for is value, overall value. So you're making an investment up front and trying to figure out the future benefits down the road. If you take a hard look at Southeast, I think what you'll find is real value.

Southeast Missouri offers over 200 areas of study in 3,900 classes. Some favorites among students are business, education, mass communication, visual and performing arts, science and technology, and liberal arts. Science, math and the teacher education program are two-time award winners of the Krista McCullough Showcase for Excellence. No other institution besides Southeast has ever been lucky enough to win twice. Nearly 90% of classes on campus are taught by full-time faculty. The Southeast Missouri Red Hawks compete in the NCAA Division I Ohio Valley Conference. There are nine current residence halls for students to choose from. Southeast offers both traditional community-style and popular suite-style housing.

There's a variety of residence halls. We have community-style living as well as suite-style living that bases on price as well. But I've had experiences in both and I've enjoyed both. If you're into the private lifestyle, I would say suite-style may be a little bit more for you, whereas if you're actively wanting to get to know more people, I would say that go for the community-style because you're going to find that the doors are a little more open.

At Southeast, there's more to do than there's time in the day, with more than 150 social and special interest organizations, 10 national fraternities, 8 sororities, and 46 intramural sports. Here at the Student Aquatic Center, you will find over 265,000 gallons of water. The 8.5 million dollar center is the only one in the country that features leisure and lap pools, a zip line and a bouldering wall. Plus, take some time off to chill and relax in the hot tub.

Check out the gum tree, the big tradition. We were actually rated in some magazine about a cool tradition that we have here and there's a huge hill here, Cardiac Hill. And the story is that once you walk up the hill, you're just too out of breath and you can't chew your gum so you put it on the tree. So, that's pretty funny and it's a big tradition and a lot of people are proud of it here.

Like the extra attention? Then zip on down to Southeast Missouri State University. I'm Ferrari St. Paul, and I will see you on the next tour.

[ Music ]