University of Illinois at Springfield

The University of Illinois at Springfield (UIS) is a public university in Springfield, Illinois

Springfield, Illinois

Springfield is the third and current capital of the US state of Illinois and the county seat of Sangamon County with a population of 117,400 , making it the sixth most populated city in the state and the second most populated Illinois city outside of the Chicago Metropolitan Area...

. The University was established in 1969 as Sangamon State University by the Illinois General Assembly

Illinois General Assembly

The Illinois General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Illinois and comprises the Illinois House of Representatives and the Illinois Senate. The General Assembly was created by the first state constitution adopted in 1818. Illinois has 59 legislative districts, with two...

and became a part of the University of Illinois system

University of Illinois system

The University of Illinois is a system of public universities in Illinois consisting of three campuses: Urbana-Champaign, Chicago, and Springfield. Across its three campuses, the University of Illinois enrolls about 70,000 students. It had an operating budget of $4.17 billion in 2007.-System:The...

on July 1, 1995.

The University of Illinois at Springfield serves almost 5,000 students in 21 undergraduate programs, 20 master's programs, and a doctorate in Public Administration

Public administration

Public Administration houses the implementation of government policy and an academic discipline that studies this implementation and that prepares civil servants for this work. As a "field of inquiry with a diverse scope" its "fundamental goal.....

. The university was once one of the two upper-division and graduate

Graduate school

A graduate school is a school that awards advanced academic degrees with the general requirement that students must have earned a previous undergraduate degree...

universities in Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

, but now accepts freshmen, transfer and graduate students.

History

In 1967, the Illinois General Assembly

Illinois General Assembly

created a Board of Regents to operate Illinois State University

Illinois State University

Illinois State University , founded in 1857, is the oldest public university in Illinois; it is located in the town of Normal. ISU is considered a "national university" that grants a variety of doctoral degrees and strongly emphasizes research; it is also recognized as one of the top ten largest...

and Northern Illinois University

Northern Illinois University

Northern Illinois University is a state university and research institution located in DeKalb, Illinois, with satellite centers in Hoffman Estates, Naperville, Rockford, and Oregon. It was originally founded as Northern Illinois State Normal School on May 22, 1895 by Illinois Governor John P...

, as well as a third unnamed institution in Springfield. In 1969, Governor

Governor of Illinois

The Governor of Illinois is the chief executive of the State of Illinois and the various agencies and departments over which the officer has jurisdiction, as prescribed in the state constitution. It is a directly elected position, votes being cast by popular suffrage of residents of the state....

Richard Ogilvie signed into law a bill officially creating Sangamon State University. It originally operated as an "upper-division" university--that is, a university that offers only the last two years of undergraduate education, as well as graduate work. The first classes were held on September 28, 1970 at First Methodist Church. In October, SSU moved to its interim facility.

The school grew steadily over the years. Its first permanent building, Brookens Library, opened in 1976, and its first dorms opened in 1980.

In 1995, Governor Jim Edgar

Jim Edgar

James Edgar is an American politician who was the 38th Governor of Illinois from 1991 to 1999 and Illinois Secretary of State from 1981 to 1991. As a moderate Republican in a largely blue-leaning state, Edgar was a popular and successful governor, leaving office with high approval ratings...

signed a bill which abolished the Board of Regents and merged SSU with the University of Illinois system. On July 1, SSU officially became the University of Illinois at Springfield. Naomi Lynn, the last president of SSU, became the first chancellor of UIS. In 2001, it admitted freshmen for the first time.

Rankings

UIS is classified in the US News and World Report rankings as a "Regional University", which is a school which provides " a full range of undergraduate programs . . . some master's level programs . . . [but] few, if any, doctoral programs." In the 2011 rankings, UIS ranks #4 amongst public Regional Universities in the Midwest Region. ("National Universities" within Illinois, such as UIUC, NIU

Northern Illinois University

, ISU

Illinois State University

, and SIUC

Southern Illinois University Carbondale

Southern Illinois University Carbondale is a public research university located in Carbondale, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1869, SIUC is the flagship campus of the Southern Illinois University system...

, are not ranked against UIS and other Regional Universities.)

Online Degrees

The University of Illinois at Springfield has been offering online courses and degrees since 1999. The Sloan Consortium

Sloan Consortium

The Sloan Consortium is an institutional and professional leadership organization dedicated to integrating online education into the mainstream of higher education. The goal of the Sloan Consortium is to "help institutions and individual educators improve the quality, scale, and breadth of online...

has recognized UIS with the 2007 award for Excellence in Institution-Wide Online Teaching and Learning and the 2008 Ralph E. Gomory Award for Quality Online Education. The Society for New Communications Research, in 2008, also recognized UIS with their Award for Excellence in Online Reputation Management.

Each year since 2001, the Sloan Consortium has offered one award for "Most Outstanding Achievement by an Individual in Online Learning" - the 2002 award was given to Professor Emeritus Ray Schroeder, the 2003 award was given to Visiting Research Professor Burks Oakley, and the 2006 award was given to the UIS James J. Stukel Distinguished Professor, Karen Swan.
Undergraduate Online Degrees

Business Administration (B.B.A.)
Computer Science (B.S.)
Economics (B.A.)
English (B.A.)
Global Studies (B.A.)
History (B.A.)
Liberal Studies (B.A.)
Mathematics (B.A., minor)
Philosophy (B.A., minor)
Women and Gender Studies (minor)

Graduate Online Degrees

Computer Science (M.S.)
Environmental Studies (M.A.)
Human Services Administration (M.A.)
Legal Studies (M.A.)
Liberal and Integrative Studies (M.A.)
Management Information Systems (M.S., minor)
Public Administration (M.P.A.)
Public Health (M.P.H.)
Teacher Leadership (M.A.)

Certification Programs Online

Mathematics, Teacher Education (Secondary)

Certificates Online

Business Process Management (Graduate)
Digital Organizations (Graduate)
Environmental Risk Assessment (Graduate)
Emergency Preparedness and Homeland Security (Graduate)
IT Project Management (Graduate)
Legal Aspects of Education (Graduate)
Chief School Business Officer (Post Master's)

Campus Life & Organizations

The UIS Journal is the weekly student newspaper of the University. Its circulation is 2,000 per week.

Campus Buildings

Most buildings are given a three-letter acronym based on the name.

Upper Quad

University Hall - UHB
Public Affairs Center - PAC
Brookens Library - BRK
Health & Sciences Building - HSB

Lower Quad

WUIS/WIPA Radio Station - WUIS
Student Life Building - SLB
Visual and Performing Arts Building - VPA
Student Affairs Building - SAB
Human Resources Building - HRB
Cox Child Care Center

Elsewhere on Campus

The Recreation and Athletic Center - TRAC

Shepherd House
Spencer House
UIS Campus Police Dept.

Campus Housing

Approximately 950 students live in campus housing. Campus apartment flats, townhouse apartments, and family housing clusters are named after native Illinois plants.

Residence Halls & Commons

Lincoln Residence Hall - LRH
Homer L. Butler Commons - HLB
Founders Residence Hall - FRH

Apartment Flats

Clover
Clover
Clover , or trefoil, is a genus of about 300 species of plants in the leguminous pea family Fabaceae. The genus has a cosmopolitan distribution; the highest diversity is found in the temperate Northern Hemisphere, but many species also occur in South America and Africa, including at high altitudes...

Court - CLV
Bluebell
Bluebell
-Plants:* genus Hyacinthoides** Common Bluebell ** Spanish Bluebell * genus Mertensia** Virginia Bluebell * Scottish Bluebell...

Court - BBL
Larkspur
Larkspur
Larkspur may refer to:* Larkspur, California* Larkspur, Colorado* Larkspur radio system, used by the British Army* Delphinium, a genus of 300 flowers with widespread nativity* Consolida, a genus of 40 flowers native to central and western Eurasia...

Court - LKR

Townhouse Apartments

Pennyroyal
Pennyroyal
Pennyroyal refers to two plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae. For the American species, see American pennyroyal. The European pennyroyal, Mentha pulegium, , is a plant in the mint genus, within the family Lamiaceae. Crushed Pennyroyal leaves exhibit a very strong fragrance similar to spearmint...

Court - PRL
Foxglove Court - FXG
Marigold
Tagetes
Tagetes is a genus of 56 species of annual and perennial mostly herbaceous plants in the sunflower family . The genus is native to North and South America, but some species have become naturalized around the world. One species, T...

Court - MGR
Trillium
Trillium
Trillium is a genus of about 40–50 species of spring ephemeral perennials, native to temperate regions of North America and Asia....

Court - TRL

Family Housing

Sunflower
Sunflower
Sunflower is an annual plant native to the Americas. It possesses a large inflorescence . The sunflower got its name from its huge, fiery blooms, whose shape and image is often used to depict the sun. The sunflower has a rough, hairy stem, broad, coarsely toothed, rough leaves and circular heads...

Court - SFL

Athletics

UIS athletic teams are known as the Prairie Stars, the university competes in the NCAA

National Collegiate Athletic Association

The National Collegiate Athletic Association is a semi-voluntary association of 1,281 institutions, conferences, organizations and individuals that organizes the athletic programs of many colleges and universities in the United States...

Division II Great Lakes Valley Conference

Great Lakes Valley Conference

The Great Lakes Valley Conference is an intercollegiate athletic conference which competes at the NCAA's Division II level. Member institutions are located in the states of Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, and Wisconsin....

. The university joined the GLVC in October 2008 and became a full-fledged Division II member on Aug. 1, 2010.

Women's

Basketball
Basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...
Golf
Golf
Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....
Soccer
Softball
Softball
Softball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of 10 to 14 players. It is a direct descendant of baseball although there are some key differences: softballs are larger than baseballs, and the pitches are thrown underhand rather than overhand...
Tennis
Tennis
Tennis is a sport usually played between two players or between two teams of two players each . Each player uses a racket that is strung to strike a hollow rubber ball covered with felt over a net into the opponent's court. Tennis is an Olympic sport and is played at all levels of society at all...
Volleyball
Volleyball
Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules.The complete rules are extensive...

Campus Streets

Most of the streets that lie within the campus are named after Illinois poets and novelists.

Vachel Lindsay
Vachel Lindsay
Nicholas Vachel Lindsay was an American poet. He is considered the father of modern singing poetry, as he referred to it, in which verses are meant to be sung or chanted...

Drive
Carl Sandburg
Carl Sandburg
Carl Sandburg was an American writer and editor, best known for his poetry. He won three Pulitzer Prizes, two for his poetry and another for a biography of Abraham Lincoln. H. L. Mencken called Carl Sandburg "indubitably an American in every pulse-beat."-Biography:Sandburg was born in Galesburg,...

Lane
Eliza Farnham
Eliza Farnham
Eliza Farnham was a 19th-century American novelist, feminist, abolitionist, and activist for prison reform. Her fame as a writer rests upon her work Life in Prairie Land , an account of life on the Illinois prairie near Pekin between 1836 and 1840. She strongly believed in the use of phrenology...

Drive
Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks was an American poet. She was appointed Poet Laureate of Illinois in 1968 and Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1985.-Biography:...

Drive
Nelson Algren
Nelson Algren
Nelson Algren was an American writer.-Early life:Algren was born Nelson Ahlgren Abraham in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Goldie and Gerson Abraham. At the age of three he moved with his parents to Chicago, Illinois where they lived in a working-class, immigrant neighborhood on the South Side...

Lane
William Maxwell
William Keepers Maxwell, Jr.
William Keepers Maxwell, Jr. was an American novelist and editor.-Life:Maxwell was born in Lincoln, Illinois, and as a child, he survived the 1918 Influenza epidemic. He attended the University of Illinois and Harvard University...

Lane
Richard Wright
Richard Wright (author)
Richard Nathaniel Wright was an African-American author of sometimes controversial novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction. Much of his literature concerns racial themes, especially those involving the plight of African-Americans during the late 19th to mid 20th centuries...

Drive
University Drive
University Plaza
Shepherd Road

Notable alumni

Vince Demuzio
Vince Demuzio
Vince Demuzio was an Illinois State Senator who died while in office. At the time, he was the most senior member of the Illinois Senate. He had once been chair of the Illinois Democratic Party....

- Illinois state senator, 1975-2004 ('81 B.A. in Education and Human Services; '96, M.A. in Education and Public Policy)
Karen A. Hasara - Former mayor of Springfield, Illinois
Springfield, Illinois
Springfield is the third and current capital of the US state of Illinois and the county seat of Sangamon County with a population of 117,400 , making it the sixth most populated city in the state and the second most populated Illinois city outside of the Chicago Metropolitan Area...

, Illinois state senator, ('72 BA Psychology, '92 MA Legal Studies)
Gordon S. Heddell
Gordon S. Heddell
Gordon S. Heddell is the Inspector General ' of the United States Department of Defense. Previously, Heddell also served as Inspector General for the Department of Labor.-Early government experience:...

- United States Department of Defense
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...

inspector general ('75 MA Legal Studies)
Robert "Bobby" McFerrin Jr.- vocal performer and conductor (attended 1975-76, did not receive degree)
Dana Perino
Dana Perino
Dana Maria Perino is an American political commentator for Fox News. She served as the White House Press Secretary for President George W. Bush from September 14, 2007 to January 20, 2009...

- White House Press Secretary for the George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

administration ('95, MA Public Affairs Reporting)
Abdul Hakim-Shabazz - Conservative talk radio host and attorney, based in Indiana and Illinois
Ward Churchill
Ward Churchill
Ward LeRoy Churchill is an author and political activist. He was a professor of ethnic studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder from 1990 to 2007. The primary focus of his work is on the historical treatment of political dissenters and Native Americans by the United States government...

- former University of Colorado
University of Colorado at Boulder
The University of Colorado Boulder is a public research university located in Boulder, Colorado...

professor
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...

, social critic, activist ('74 BA Communications, '75 MA Communications)
Timothy Davlin
Timothy Davlin
Timothy J. Davlin was the mayor of the U.S. city of Springfield, Illinois, from April 2003 until his suicide in December 2010. Though the Mayor's office is officially non-partisan, the Illinois capital has a strong tradition of partisanship, even for municipal races, and both major parties of...

- Mayor of Springfield, Illinois
Springfield, Illinois
Springfield is the third and current capital of the US state of Illinois and the county seat of Sangamon County with a population of 117,400 , making it the sixth most populated city in the state and the second most populated Illinois city outside of the Chicago Metropolitan Area...

(attended, did not graduate)
Al Lewis - Columnist, Dow Jones Newswires
Wayne Rosenthal
Wayne Rosenthal (politician)
Wayne Rosenthal is the Republican nominee for the Illinois House of Representatives, representing the 98th district in the central Illinois area. This is an open seat, currently held by Betsy Hannig, who was appointed to the vacancy created by the resignation of her husband, who held that office...

- Current (2010) Republican nominee for Illinois House of Representatives

Notable faculty

Phillip S. Paludan
Phillip S. Paludan
Phillip Shaw Paludan, was a professor of Lincoln Studies at the University of Illinois, Springfield, and a leading authority on the life and presidency of Abraham Lincoln....

, professor of history - Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

and American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

scholar, Lincoln Prize
Lincoln Prize
The Lincoln Prize, endowed by Richard Gilder and Lewis Lehrman and administered by the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College, has been awarded annually since 1991 for the best non-fiction historical work of the year on the American Civil War. It is named for U.S...

recipient, and the Naomi B. Lynn Distinguished Chair of Lincoln Studies (died August 1, 2007).
Paul Simon
Paul Simon (politician)
Paul Martin Simon was an American politician from Illinois. He served in the United States House of Representatives from 1975 to 1985 and United States Senate from 1985 to 1997. He was a member of the Democratic Party...

, Founder/first director of UIS' Public Affairs Reporting Master's Program - United States senator, 1988 presidential candidate

External links

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