Idaho State University (ISU) is a public university located in Pocatello, Idaho, United States. It has outreach programs in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho Falls, Boise and Twin Falls.

ISU's seven colleges offer academic study in the natural and physical sciences, humanities, performing and visual arts, education, engineering, business, pharmacy and technology, with a total of over 280 available programs.

Enrollment for the fall semester in 2009 stood at 15,553 total students, making ISU the second-largest major university in the State of Idaho in terms of full-time enrollment. Previously, ISU enrolled a large number of older, part-time students who lived and worked off-campus; this demographic is decreasing as ISU is attempting to make the transition to a more traditional undergraduate population. The student-teacher ratio at ISU is 16:1.

Notable programs at ISU include physics, pharmacy, biology, liberal arts, anthropology, business, physician assistant and nursing. ISU is attempting to open the state's first medical school, and has begun a Family Medicine Residency Program, which was awarded a $960,000 federal grant.

Idaho (ⁱ/ˈaɪdəhoʊ/) is a state in the Rocky Mountain area of the United States. Idaho is the 14th most expansive, the 39th most populous, and the 7th least densely populated of the 50 United States. The state's largest city and capital is Boise. Residents are called "Idahoans". Idaho was admitted to the Union on July 3, 1890, as the 43rd state.

Idaho is a mountainous state with an area larger than that of all of New England. It is landlocked, surrounded by the states of Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Montana and the Canadian province of British Columbia. However, the network of dams and locks on the Columbia River and Snake River make the city of Lewiston the farthest inland seaport on the Pacific coast of the contiguous United States.

Idaho's nickname is the Gem State, because nearly every known type of gemstone has been found there. In addition, Idaho is one of only two places in the world where star garnets can be found (the other is the Himalaya Mountains, in India)^{[citation needed]}, and is the only place six-pointed star garnets have been found^{[citation needed]}. Additionally Idaho is sometimes called the Potato State owing to its popular crop. The state motto is Esto Perpetua (Latin for "Let it be forever").

Ronald Ernest "Ron" Paul (born August 20, 1935) is an American politician who has been the U.S. Representative for Texas's 14th congressional district, which includes Galveston, since 1997, and a three-time candidate for President of the United States, as a Libertarian in 1988 and as a Republican in 2008 and currently 2012. He is an outspoken critic of American foreign and monetary policies, including the Military–industrial complex and the Federal Reserve, and is known for his libertarian-leaning views, often differing from his own party on certain issues.

A native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Paul is a graduate of Gettysburg College and Duke University School of Medicine, where he earned his medical degree. He served as a medical officer in the United States Air Force from 1963 until 1968. He worked as an obstetrician-gynecologist from the 1960s to the 1980s, delivering more than 4,000 babies. He became the first Representative in history to serve concurrently with a child in the Senate when his son Rand Paul was elected to the United States Senate for Kentucky in 2010.