With eighty-five acres downtown, and extending into Solon and Westlake campuses, Cleveland State University now offers over 1,000 courses across 200 fields of study, and it all began with a few students.
In the 1870's, The Cleveland YMCA began offering free courses to young men without access to higher learning, expanding in 1918 to enroll females, and providing innovative internships for professional experience and affordable education.
The program was reestablished as Fenn College in 1929, and grew to 2,500 students being officially adopted as Cleveland State University, Ohio's seventh state university, in 1964.
Just five years later, CSU acquired the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, the result of a 1946 merger between The Cleveland Law School and John Marshall School, and has remained one of the largest law schools in Ohio since.
Over the coming decades, Cleveland State University’s campus, enrollment, and educational system underwent immense growth. With abundant academic programs, a $350 million campus renovation, and 120,000 alumni and counting, the university has matured into an esteemed establishment of strong, diverse higher education.
