|
|
|
|
University of Minnesota
|
| |
|
| |
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth largest student body in the United States, with 51,140 students.
university was founded on February 25th 1851, but it did not begin enrolling students until 1867 due to financial problems and the Civil War.
Discussion
Ask a question about 'University of Minnesota' Start a new discussion about 'University of Minnesota' Answer questions from other users |
Recent Posts
Encyclopedia
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth largest student body in the United States, with 51,140 students.
History
The university was founded on February 25th 1851, but it did not begin enrolling students until 1867 due to financial problems and the Civil War. After a sizable loan from John Sargent Pillsbury, known to many as the Father of the University, it was then that the school reopened. Pillsbury, a University regent, state senator and governor, used this political influence for the university to become the recipient of the Morrill Land-Grant Act, which meant that the federal government provided land for use or to sell to provide education for students of all incomes, as well as maintaining a commitment to the state's agriculture as still seen today on the St. Paul Campus, the Arboretum and the development of the state fruit: the Honeycrisp Apple.
The first president, inaugurated on December 22, 1869, was William Watts Folwell. The first bachelor of arts degrees were received in 1873, doctor of philosophy degree in 1888. The Duluth, Morris and Crookston campuses joined the system in 1947, 1960 and 1966 respectively.
Campus
Minneapolis
- External link:
The original Minneapolis campus overlooked the Saint Anthony Falls on the Mississippi River, but it was later moved about a mile downstream to its current location. The original site is now marked by a small park known as Chute Square at the intersection of University Avenue and Central Avenue. The school shut down following a financial crisis during the American Civil War, but reopened in 1867 with considerable financial help from John S. Pillsbury. It was upgraded from a preparatory school to a college in 1869.(Pitmod, Boc, Barryus & Ouz).
Today's campus has buildings on both banks of the river, but the East Bank is the main portion of the campus and covers .
East Bank
To simplify the size of campus, the University has broken down the east bank into several areas. These areas are the Knoll area, Mall area, Health area, Athletic area, and Gateway area.
The Knoll area is the oldest part of the University in its current location. It is located in the northeastern part of campus. Subjects in this area tend to lean towards the humanities and Burton Hall is home to the College of Education and Human Development. Many of the buildings in this area are well over a hundred years old and 13 of the buildings in this area are on the National Register of Historic Places. One residence hall, Sanford Hall, and one student apartment complex, Roy Wilkins Hall, are located in the knoll area.
Northrop Mall or the mall area, is arguably the center of the Minneapolis Campus. It was based on a design by Cass Gilbert, although his plans were too extravagant to be fully implemented. Several of the campus' primary buildings surround the Mall. Northrop Auditorium provides a northern anchor, with Coffman Memorial Union to the south. Four of the larger buildings on the sides of the Mall are the primary mathematics, physics, and chemistry buildings, and Walter Library. The mall area is home to both the College of Liberal Arts and the Institute of Technology. Behind Coffman Memorial Union, lies another residence hall, Comstock Hall, and another student apartment complex, Yudof Hall.
To the southeast of the mall area lies the health area. This part of campus focuses on both undergraduate buildings for biological science students, as well as homes to Pharmacy, Nursing, Dentistry, the Medical school, the School of Public Health, and also Fairview clinics and hospitals. This complex of buildings forms what's known as the University of Minnesota Medical Center. Part of the College of Biological Sciences is housed in this part of campus.
Across the street from Fairview hospital lies what's known as the "Superblock". The superblock is a 4-city block space housing four university residence halls (Pioneer Hall, Frontier Hall, Centennial Hall, and Territorial Hall). The Superblock tends to be one of the most popular locations for on-campus housing due to the fact that it is the largest concentration of students living on campus and has a multitude of social activities between the four residence halls.
Directly north of the Superblock is the Athletic area of campus. Students can utilize four different recreation facilities when they are taking classes. These facilities include: the University Rec Center, Cooke Hall, the University Fieldhouse, and the University Aquatic Center. These four athletic facilities are all connected by tunnel and skyway allowing students to use one locker room facility. North of this complex lies TCF Bank Stadium, Williams Arena, Mariucci Arena, Ridder Arena, and the Baseline Tennis Center.
The easternmost area, the Gateway area, tends to be home to more office buildings instead of classrooms and lecture halls. The most prominent building is McNamara Alumni Center. The University is also heavily invested in a biomedical research initiative and is striving to build five more biomedical research buildings in ten years. These buildings will form a biomedical corridor directly north of TCF Bank Stadium.
The East Bank has a few buildings with unique architecture worth mentioning. The Armory, northeast of the Northrop Mall, is built like a Norman castle, with a sally port entrance facing Church Street, and a tower originally intended to be the Professor of Military Science's residence, until it was found to be too cold. It originally held the athletics department as well as the military science classes that it now holds. One of the oldest buildings on campus is Pillsbury Hall, designed in the Richardsonian Romanesque style and built out of varieties of sandstone available in Minnesota. It has a unique color that is hard to capture in a photograph.
In more recent times, Frank Gehry designed the Weisman Art Museum. It is a typical example of his work with curving metallic structures. Another new building on campus is the addition to the Architecture building that was designed by Steven Holl and completed in 2002. It won an American Institute of Architects award for its innovative design. The Architecture building was then re-named Rapson Hall after the local modernist architect and school of architecture dean Ralph Rapson. The University of Minnesota also boasts a historic Greek row north of Northrop Mall on University Avenue SE.
The East Bank campus is bordered by Stadium Village to the southeast and Dinkytown to the north.
West Bank
The West Bank of the campus has been growing rapidly, first seeing major development in the 1960s. It covers 53 acres (0.21 km²). Music, theater, and art students cannot pass through the university without spending a significant amount of time there, in what is known as the , home to several annual interdisciplinary arts festivals. In addition to the arts, social science is a significant area of research on the West Bank. The business school (Carlson School of Management) calls the West Bank home, as does the university's Law School and the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs. Wilson Library, the largest library in the university system, is also located there. Visitors to the West Bank will no doubt notice Middlebrook Hall, the largest residence hall on campus. Approximately 900 students reside in the building named in honor of William T. Middlebrook.
Getting around
Students traveling between the East and West Banks will most likely use the Washington Avenue Bridge either on foot, designated bike-lanes, or via free shuttle service. This bridge has two separate decks: the lower deck carries vehicular traffic, while the upper deck is a pedestrian walkway. An unheated enclosed walkway runs the length of the bridge and shelters students from the wind, rain, and snow as they cross the Mississippi. Walking and riding bicycles are the most common mode of transportation among students; however, university police target students for jaywalking in areas surrounding the university with fines as high as $250. The enforcement of petty crime by university police has outraged many students because other more pertinent safety issues have seemingly been neglected, such as a string of assaults in the Dinkytown area, as well as numerous other cases of theft and vandalism perpetrated against students and their property.
There are some subterranean passageways that students use to get from building to building when the weather is harsh. Many people don't know they exist. However, directions are marked with signs reading, "The Gopher Way".
The Minneapolis campus is located near I-94 and I-35W. It is bordered on the north by the Dinkytown neighborhood and by the Stadium Village neighborhood on the southeast.
Two light rail stations have been proposed beneath the university along the proposed Central Corridor light rail line. Stations have been proposed on the East Bank and the West Bank.
St. Paul
- External link:
The university's St. Paul campus is located north and east of the Saint Anthony Park neighborhood of St. Paul, in the suburban city of Falcon Heights. Despite this, all university buildings on the campus have St. Paul street addresses. While known for agriculture, forestry, biology and human ecology, many other disciplines from social sciences to vocational education have in recent years been added to the campus. The extensive lawns, flowers, trees, wood lots and the surrounding university research farm plots creates a greener and quieter campus. It has a grassy mall of its own and can be seen as a bit of a retreat from the busier Minneapolis campus. Prominent on campus is Bailey Hall, the only residence hall in St. Paul.
Students have commuted between the two sites for many decades. Early on, a streetcar line between the campuses was established, but it dissolved along with the bulk of the area's trolleys in the 1950s. Subsequently, buses were used, and a busway was created in 1992 to decrease the travel time between campuses. Unfortunately, the rate of collisions was fairly high with 32 crashes piling up over the years. Hence in 1997, new stop signs were added that would illuminate when a bus, bicycle, or pedestrian was approaching an intersection along the corridor. As of 2002, no additional accidents had been reported.
The St. Paul campus also borders the fairgrounds where the Minnesota State Fair is held every year. Minnesota's Fair is one of the largest in the United States, usually lasting twelve days, from late August through Labor Day in early September. Because of the heavy traffic associated with the Fair, classes do not start on either campus until after it is over, enabling the Fair to utilize the campus parking facilities. The university telephone system trunk lines utilize Minneapolis exchanges and area code (612).
Organization and administration
The university has sixteen schools and colleges:
The university recently reorganized its college system, merging some of the colleges together. General College, the School of Social Work and the Department of Family Social Science from the College of Human Ecology merged with the old College of Education and Human Development, forming a new College of Education and Human Development, while the College of Natural Resources merged with the College of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Sciences into the new College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences (CFANS). The design-oriented programs from the College of Human Ecology merged with the College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture(CALA), creating the new College of Design. These plans were controversial, particularly the closing of General College, which had been the entry point to the university for many first-generation students, low-income students, students with disabilities, athletes, and students of color since its founding in 1932.
Human Rights Center
The University of Minnesota Human Rights Center was inaugurated in December 1988 on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The center works locally, nationally, and internationally to provide training, educational materials, and assistance to professionals, students, and volunteers working to promote and protect human rights, assisting human rights advocates, monitors, students, and educators through its programs and resources, including the Human Rights Library, This Is My Home, the Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship Program, the International Women's Rights Action Watch, and the Human Rights and Peace Store. More information on the Center and links to its various programs can be found at .
Academics
The second largest institution of higher education in the Midwest, offers degree programs in many fields, from agriculture to modern dance. The university has all three branches of the Reserve Officer Training Corps.
Rankings
The University of Minnesota has recently made an explicit goal to become one of the top three public research universities in the world within a decade.
In 2007 (previously the Times Higher Education Supplement) ranked the University of Minnesota at 142 (with ) in its ranking of the , up from 172 in 2006.
In 2007, the Shanghai Jiao Tong University ranked the University of Minnesota at 33 on the list of .
In August 2008, US News & World Report's 2009 Rankings placed the undergraduate program of The University of Minnesota as the 61st best National University in the United States. (National Universities are defined as those universities which "offer a full range of undergraduate majors as well as master's and doctoral degrees. In many cases, they place strong emphasis on research and receive federal money to support their research endeavors.")
19 U of M graduate school departments have been ranked in the nation's top twenty by the National Research Council.
In 2006, Businessweek ranked the undergraduate business program at the Carlson School of Management 26th in the nation.
Media
The Minnesota Daily is printed Monday through Thursday during the normal school season, with an online-only version appearing Fridays. The Minnesota Daily is printed once each week during the summer. The Daily is operated by an autonomous organization of students and is the largest student-run paper in the United States. It was first published on May 1, 1900. A long-defunct but fondly remembered humor magazine, Ski-U-Mah, was published from about 1930 to 1950. It launched the career of novelist and scriptwriter Max Shulman. A relative newcomer to the university's print media community is The Wake Student Magazine, a weekly publication that covers university and campus-related stories and provides a forum for student expression. The magazine was first published in 2002 and became an official university-sanctioned student group in 2003. Additionally, the Wake publishes Liminal, a literary journal at the university that began in 2005. "Liminal" was created in the absence of an undergraduate literary journal and continues to bring poetry and prose to the university community. The journal is free and has been received as a major success by the university community. In 2005 conservatives on campus began formulating a new, monthly magazine named the Minnesota Republic. The first issue was released in February 2006, and funding by student service fees started in September 2006.
The campus radio station, KUOM "Radio K", broadcasts an eclectic variety of independent music during the day on 770 kHz AM. Its 5000-watt signal has a range of , but shuts down at dusk due to FCC regulations. In 2003, the station added a low-power (8 watt) signal on 106.5 MHz FM overnight and on weekends. In 2005, a 10-watt translator began broadcasting from Falcon Heights, MN on 100.7 FM at all times. Radio K also streams its content at www.radiok.org. With roots in experimental transmissions that began before World War I, the station received the first AM broadcast license in the state on January 13, 1922 and began broadcasting as WLB, changing to the KUOM call sign about two decades later. The station had an educational format up until 1993 when it merged with a smaller campus-only music station to become what is now known as Radio K. A small group of full-time employees are joined by over 20 part-time student employees who oversee the station. Most of the on-air talent consists of student volunteers.
Some television programs made on campus have been broadcast on local PBS station KTCI channel 17. Several episodes of Great Conversations have been made since 2002, featuring one-on-one discussions between university faculty and experts brought in from around the world. Tech Talk is a show meant to help people who feel intimidated by modern technology, including cellular phones and computers.
The university developed GOPHER, a precursor to the World Wide Web which used hyperlinks to connect documents across computers on the internet. However the version produced by CERN was favored by the public since it was free unlike GOPHER.
Athletics
The University of Minnesota's intercollegiate sports teams are called the "Golden Gophers" and are members of the Big Ten Conference and the Western Collegiate Hockey Association in the NCAA. Minnesota is one of only 13 universities in the country offering NCAA Division I-A football, Division I men's and women's basketball, and Division I ice hockey. The current athletic director is Joel Maturi.
The Golden Gophers' most notable rivalry is the annual college football game between them and the Wisconsin Badgers for Paul Bunyan's Axe, the longest-running rivalry in NCAA sports. The two universities also compete in the Border Battle, a year-long athletic competition in which each sport season is worth 40 points divided by the number of times the teams play each other (i.e. football is worth 40 points because they play each other only once, while women's ice hockey is worth 10 points per game because they play four times a year). Conference and post-season playoffs do not count in the point standings.
Goldy Gopher is the mascot for the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities campus and the associated sports teams. The Gopher mascot is a tradition as old as the state. Minnesota was tabbed the “Gopher State” in 1857 after a political cartoon ridiculing the $5 million Railroad Loan which helped open up the West. The cartoon portrayed shifty railroad barons as striped gophers pulling a railroad car carrying the Territorial Legislature toward the "Slough of Despond". Later, the university picked up the nickname, as the first U of M yearbook bearing the name "Gopher Annual" appeared in 1887.
Football
The Minnesota Golden Gophers are one of the oldest programs in college football history. They have won 6 National Championships and 18 Big Ten Conference Championships. The Gophers played their first game on September 29, 1882, a 4-0 victory over Hamline University. Eight years later in 1890, the Gophers played host to Wisconsin in a 63–0 victory. With the exception of 1906, the Gophers and Badgers have played each other every year since then. The 117 games played against each other is the most played rivalry in Division I-A college football .
In 1981, the Gophers played their last game in Memorial Stadium and have been playing their home games in the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome ever since. The Gophers will move back to campus in 2009 when their new home, TCF Bank Stadium, opens.
Basketball
The Golden Gophers men's basketball team has won two National Championships, one National Invitation Tournament (NIT) Championship and eight Big Ten Regular Season Championships. They also have six NCAA Tournament appearances not including the 1997 appearance in which they reached the Final Four that was voided due to academic fraud, and three Sweet 16 appearances.
The Gophers' men's basketball coach, Dan Monson, resigned on November 30, 2006. Jim Molinari served as interim head coach for the remainder of the 2007 season. , university officials confirmed the hire of former University of Kentucky head coach Tubby Smith.
The Golden Gophers women's basketball team has enjoyed success in recent years under Pam Borton, including a Final Four appearance in 2004. Overall, they have six NCAA Tournament appearances and three Sweet 16 appearances.
Ice hockey
The Golden Gophers men's ice hockey program has established itself in recent years (as it did during the tenure of Herb Brooks) as a dominating force in college hockey. A Gopher's hockey tradition is to stock the roster almost exclusively (sometimes completely) with Minnesota natives. The team has won 5 National Championships and 12 WCHA Regular Season Championships, most recently in 2007. They also have won 14 WCHA Tournament Championships and have 19 NCAA Frozen Four appearances. Home games are played at Mariucci Arena. The Gophers three big rivals include St. Cloud State, Wisconsin, and North Dakota.
The Golden Gophers women's hockey team has won three National Championships and four WCHA Regular Season Championships. They have also won three WCHA Tournament Championships and have 5 NCAA Frozen Four appearances. They play their home games in Ridder Arena. They were the first collegiate women's hockey team to play in an arena dedicated solely to women's ice hockey.
Wrestling
The University of Minnesota has been fielding wrestling teams for 92 seasons. In that time, they have accumulated over 800 dual meet wins, the sixth highest total in college wrestling history. Home meets are primarily held in the 5,700 seat Sports Pavilion in Minneapolis. The Gopher team won three Division I championships in 2001, 2002 and 2007 as well as several individual championships.
Fight song
Notable among a number of songs commonly played and sung at various events such as commencement and convocation, and athletic games is: Minnesota Rouser, the University of Minnesota fight song.
See Also
Nomenclature
- The abbreviation U of M is very widely used in various official ways and in news reports and colloquial speech. (Several other universities are also called the U of M, at least one of them officially. See the U of M disambiguation page.)
- It is also often referred to as "the U" by locals.
- Some residents in other parts of the state refer to the Twin Cities Campus as, "The Main U".
- "umn" is used only in Internet domain names.
- Some students refer to the university as UMinn to differentiate itself from U of Michigan and U of Miami amongst other "U of M"s.
External links
|
| |
|
|
