Founded in 1909 as an agricultural training school, Arkansas State has grown into a university with over 16,000 students and 6 satellite facilities serving Arkansas towns and cities.
Degree programs are offered in agriculture, business, communications, education, engineering, fine arts, humanities and social sciences, nursing and health professions, sciences and mathematics, and military science.
The school is affiliated with the Sunbelt Conference in sports and maintains NCAA I-A Division programs in the major sports. The school sports teams are nicknamed "Indians" in honor of the Osage tribe of Native Americans that inhabited the area until the 19th century.