Emporia State University is located at the eastern edge of the Flint Hills in eastern Kansas. The Department of Biological Sciences has over 30 graduate students and 14 full-time faculty members. Emporia is a small town of 27,000 that is situated within easy driving distance to the Kansas cities of Topeka, Wichita, Lawrence, Manhattan, and Kansas City. The faculty at ESU are dedicated to and highly involved in student education.
Faculty take students to a number of meetings each year at the local, regional, and national level.
Students have the opportunity to take classes in foreign countries and see the herps of the Bahamas and Mexico first-hand. The Department of Biological Sciences has several natural areas where students can do research. This includes a wetland, two small woodland areas, and a large tract of prairie. The biology graduate students have an active graduate student organization. The biology faculty maintain a strong organismal focus.