Photo: Billy Hathorn (CC BY-SA 3.0)
School data & stats
Outcomes
Cost
Community
Overview
Northwestern State is a public university in Natchitoches, one of Louisiana's oldest towns, sitting along the Cane River in the state's historic Creole heartland. It is known for teacher education, nursing, and the Louisiana Scholars' College, the state's designated public honors college for the liberal arts, which draws academically driven students into a smaller, seminar-based program within the larger university.
Academics
Education and nursing are the university's largest and best-established programs, training a substantial share of the region's teachers and nurses. The Louisiana Scholars' College offers an alternative track — a small, discussion-based liberal arts curriculum with its own admission standards, distinct from the broader university's more accessible general admission.
Campus & student life
Natchitoches is a small, historic riverfront town — its downtown of galleries and Creole architecture gives campus life a distinctly Southern, small-city character, reinforced by the town's well-known Christmas Festival each winter. Student life outside the Scholars' College leans toward a traditional regional-university social scene.
Getting in
General university admission is accessible and grade-based, while the Scholars' College requires a separate, more selective application emphasizing writing and academic record.
Worth knowing
A student drawn to Northwestern State specifically for rigorous liberal-arts seminars should apply to the Louisiana Scholars' College directly rather than assume general university admission covers it — the two have meaningfully different academic cultures under one roof.
Admissions
Deadlines (2026–27 cycle)
Applying
nsula.edu ↗High school coursework
Required4 years of English (English I-IV) · 4 years of mathematics (Algebra I, geometry, Algebra II, plus a fourth unit) · 4 years of science (biology, chemistry, plus 2 more) · 4 years of social studies · 2 years of the same foreign language (or 2 speech courses) · 1 year of arts
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