Syracuse University S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications

— -- Syracuse University and its 200-acre hilltop campus dominate the upstate New York landscape near Onondaga Lake.

Chartered in 1870, SU is among the state's largest private academic institutions, with eight professional colleges and a full-time student body of about 16,000.

In athletics, Syracuse is best known for SU Orange basketball, a perennial NCAA Big East powerhouse. In the media world, the university is most closely linked to the students who graduate from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, recognized as one of America's premier schools of mass communications.

The Newhouse four-year program attracts students from all over the world -- current enrollment is just under 1,800. Most of the more than 60 faculty members are professionals drawn from the communications industry.

The curriculum emphasizes computer-based, interactive multimedia with specialized study in broadcast and print journalism, digital online communication, advertising, photojournalism, public relations and television-radio-film.