East St. Louis, Illinois in the context of "Cahokia Mounds"

Interstate 55 (I-55) is a major north–south Interstate Highway in the US state of Illinois that connects St. Louis, Missouri, to the Chicago metropolitan area. It enters the state from Missouri near East St. Louis, Illinois, and runs to U.S. Route 41 (US 41, Lake Shore Drive) near Downtown Chicago, where the highway ends, a distance of 294.38 miles (473.76 km). The road also runs through the Illinois cities of Springfield, Bloomington, and Joliet. The section in Cook County is officially named the Stevenson Expressway for the governor, and in DuPage County it's officially named the Joliet Freeway or the Will Rogers Freeway for the humorist. The section from the south suburbs to the area near Pontiac is officially named the Barack Obama Presidential Expressway after the president, who launched his political career from Illinois.

Cahokia Mounds /kəˈhoʊkiə/ (11 MS 2) is the site of a Native American city (which existed c. 1050–1350 CE) directly across the Mississippi River from present-day St. Louis. The state archaeology park lies in south-western Illinois between East St. Louis and Collinsville. The park covers 2,200 acres (890 ha), or about 3.5 square miles (9 km), and contains about 80 manmade mounds, but the ancient city was much larger. At its apex around 1100 CE, the city covered about 6 square miles (16 km), included about 120 earthworks in a wide range of sizes, shapes, and functions, and had a population of between 15,000 and 20,000 people.

Cahokia was the largest and most influential urban settlement of the Mississippian culture, which developed advanced societies across much of what is now the Central and the Southeastern United States, beginning around 1000 CE. Today, the Cahokia Mounds are considered to be the largest and most complex archaeological site north of the great pre-Columbian cities in Mexico.

Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE) is a public university in Edwardsville, Illinois, United States. Located within the Metro East of Greater St. Louis, SIUE was established in 1957 as an extension of Southern Illinois University Carbondale. It is the younger of the two major institutions of the Southern Illinois University system. SIUE has eight constituent undergraduate and graduate colleges, including those in arts and sciences, business, dentistry, education, engineering, graduate study, nursing, and pharmacy, in addition to it main campus it also hosts the East St. Louis Center closer to the city of St Louis.

While most of SIUE's students are from Illinois, out-of-state and international students account for 19% of enrollment. SIUE offers in-state tuition for undergraduate students from all 50 states. The university offers numerous extracurricular activities to its students, including athletics, honor societies, student clubs and organizations, as well as fraternities and sororities. The university has more than 115,000 alumni.

Lewis and Clark Community College is a public community college in Godfrey, Illinois. It serves approximately 3,973 credit and non-credit students annually. The college has nine locations throughout the St. Louis Metro East, including a campus and humanities center in Edwardsville, Illinois; community education centers in Alton, Illinois, Carlinville, Illinois and Jerseyville, Illinois; a training center in Bethalto, Illinois; a river research center in East Alton, Illinois; and a location at the East St. Louis Higher Education Center in East St. Louis, Illinois. Lewis and Clark community college has career and transfer study options. The college also offers personal enrichment programming for adults and children, as well as corporate and safety training options for professionals.