So, you're thinking about attending a college or university in Kansas?

Located in the heartland of the country, Kansas is bordered by to the north by Nebraska, to the east by Missouri, to the south by Oklahoma, and to the west by Colorado. The name Kansas comes from the Kansas River, which, in turn, owes its name to the Siouan word Kansa meaning "People of the south winds." The geodetic center of North America, which is the central reference point for all maps produced by the government, as well as the geographic center of the 48 contiguous states is located here.

Since Kansas lies on the great central plain of the U.S., it has a typically flat or slightly undulating surface. Thanks in part to this, Kansas is one of the most productive agricultural states, especially in wheat production. While, on a large scale, the state seems to be almost perfectly flat, it actually has a gradual slop up from east to west.

The majority of the state has cold winters and hot summers. The annual precipitation for the state ranges from around 46 inches in the southeast to 16 inches in the southwest. Snowfall runs from about 5 inches annually in the southmost areas to 35 inches in the northwestern portion of the state.

Even though Kansas is ranked as the 9th or 10th sunniest state in the United States, it is still vulnerable to strong thunderstorms, especially in the spring. Many of these end up becoming supercell thunderstorm clusters which bring with them tornadoes that often have a strength of F3 or higher. The average number of tornadoes that occur in the state of Kansas is 50 or more.

In 2006, Kansas had an estimated population of 2,764,075. This is only an increase of approximately 15,903, or 0.6%, from the previous year. As determined in 2004, about 5.5% of the population were foreign-born, which is around 149,800 individuals, and 1.7%, or 47,000 people, were illegal aliens.

Though Kansas is considered to be one of the most Republican states in the nation, there has been a long running feud between the socially moderate members of the party and the socially conservative members. It has become so bad that, when talking of politics in Kansas, there are often said to be three parties: the Democrats, the moderate Republicans, and the conservative Republicans. Although, in the 2004 presidential election, George W. Bush won the state's support by a huge margin of 25 points, claiming 62% of the total vote, in 2006, the Democrats not only retained the governorship of the state but picked up six seats in the House of Representatives.

Kansas income tax is divided into three different income brackets, ranging from 3.5% to 6.45%. The state sales tax is currently set at 5.3%, though various cities and counties throughout the state have levied an additional local rate as well. In December 2003, the unemployment rate of the state was approximately 4.9%.

The state of Kansas has several colleges and universities to pick from if you want to go to school here. They include such places as:

• Kansas State University

• The University of Kansas

To find more information about universities and colleges in this area, visit the Online College Degrees page on this website.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Kansas".

Free College Planning Resources