Beloit College

Beloit College
motto	Scientia vera cum fide pura
founding	1846
Sponsorship	Private
place	Beloit , Wisconsin , United States
president	Scott Bierman
Students	1,208 (2015)
Employee	110 (2015)
Foundation assets	US $ 130+ million
University sports	Midwest Conference
Website	www.beloit.edu

The Beloit College is a private liberal arts college in Beloit (Wisconsin) , which in 1846 by seven Friends for Education was established and thus the oldest existing university in Wisconsin. The college offers an undergraduate degree ( undergraduate studies ) in the liberal arts (liberal arts) and natural sciences (Sciences).

history

Middle College, the oldest building in Beloit College

The Logan Anthropology Museum at Beloit College

Secular Chapel

The initiative to found the college came from a group of seven pioneers in what was then Wisconsin Territory , who came from New England and joined together as Friends for Education . They collected an endowment for this purpose and had the Wisconsin Territory administration officially approve the foundation of the college, which happened on February 2, 1846. The first building was erected in 1847; it is now called Middle College . The first lectures were held there in autumn 1847. The first president of the college from December 1849 was the Puritan priest and Yale graduate Aaron Lucius Chapin (1817-1892), who headed the college until 1886. After the then usual four-year course (quadrennium) for a Bachelor's degree , the first year of the college graduated in 1851.

As a private foundation university, Beloit College had no official denominational affiliation , but was unofficially linked to the United Church of Christ from the 19th century .

The college's oldest collection was a mineral and plant collection created by college students and faculty. It was from 1849 to 1869 in Middle College and from 1869 in the new Memorial Hall . In the 1890s, the collection comprised 4,000 objects, including 900 specimens. In 1893, Frank Logan, a Chicago grain merchant, bequeathed an extensive collection (approximately 3,000 items) of Native American archeological and ethnological artifacts to the college . Logan had acquired the collection the previous year for $ 15,000 and through the mediation of an acquaintance had become aware of Beloit College in 1893; in the same year he joined its Board of Trustees and donated his collection, which was officially taken over by the college on January 15, 1894.

These collections laid the groundwork for the Logan Museum of Anthropology , which was established under that name in the early 20th century and has since housed the geological, ethnological and archaeological collections of Beloit College. At the turn of the 20th century, Beloit College developed a brisk construction activity. The Memorial Hall was remodeled and made 1905 the seat of the Logan Museum.

The art collection of Beloit College was also donated by a private person: Helen Brace Emerson bequeathed her art collection to the college in 1892 and added new acquisitions to it in the following years. To accommodate the art collection, Beloit College, together with the city of Beloit, built a museum from 1929 to 1930 for $ 139,000, which was named after the art historian and Beloit professor Theodore Lyman Wright (1858-1926). The Wright Museum of Art was renovated in 1949 and added a second floor. An extension was added in the 1960s. The last renovation took place in 1996.

After the Second World War , the number of students rose rapidly (up to over 1,000), as the Serviceman's Readjustment Act of 1944 gave war veterans support with university studies.

In 1964, Beloit College changed the structure of its courses significantly: According to the so-called Beloit Plan , the division of the course into eight semesters was given up in favor of a division into academic years. The first three years of study consisted of closed academic curricula, the fourth year of study was devoted to practice as a field term . In 1978 the college reverted to its previous study structure, but retained some elements of the Beloit Plan . The courses have a large practical component, for example in the course of anthropological and geological field studies.

Subjects

Beloit College offers an undergraduate degree up to a bachelor's degree ( Bachelor of Arts , Bachelor of Science ) as well as preparatory courses. More than 50 courses in fields such as my major ( Major selectable), including English Studies , Anthropology , Biochemistry , Biology , Chemistry , Critical Identity Studies, geology , history , health sciences , computer science , International Relations , Classics , Comparative Literature , Art History , Mathematics , Media Studies , Modern Foreign languages ​​(Chinese, German, French, Japanese, Russian, Spanish), musicology , pedagogy , philosophy , physics , political science , psychology , religious studies , dance , theater studies and environmental sciences and economics .

Practical relevance and professional experience are expressly supported by the college and form a prominent part of its academic profile. The college has established a number of partnerships, scholarships, and events for this purpose.

Students

In 2015, Beloit College had 1,208 students from 46 states and 40 other countries. Most of the students (26%) are from Illinois , 17% from Wisconsin , and 15% from other Midwestern states . 10% of the students are foreign nationals.

Of the 110 permanent lecturers, 95% have a doctorate or the highest academic degree in their respective subject. The supervisory ratio (students to lecturers) is therefore 11: 1. The courses have an average of 15 participants; about a third of the courses have fewer than ten participants.

Personalities

Alumni

• Matthew Aid (1958–2018), military historian and author
• Roy Chapman Andrews (1884–1960), explorer and paleontologist
• James Arness (1923-2011), actor
• Charles Waldron Buckley (1835–1906), pastor and politician
• Edward R. Burke (1880–1968), politician
• Lucien B. Caswell (1827-1919), politician
• Adolph Dubs (1920–1979), diplomat
• Jacob Falconer (1869–1928), politician
• Charles N. Fowler (1852-1932), politician
• George Lincoln Hendrickson (1865–1963), classical philologist
• Robert G. Houdek (1940-2010), diplomat
• Jan Heller Levi (* 1954), poet
• William H. McMaster (1877–1968), politician
• Kerwin Mathews (1926-2007), film actor
• Jameson Parker (born 1947), film actor
• John Pasquin (* 1944), television and film director
• Richard F. Pettigrew (1848–1926), politician
• Morton Rhue (born 1950), author
• Amy Sillman (born 1955), painter
• Luke Somers (1981-2014), photojournalist
• John Strange (1852-1923), politician
• William Vandivert (1912–1989), photographer
• Adoniram J. Warner (1834-1910), politician
• W. Willard Wirtz (1912-2010), politician
• Amy Wright (born 1950), actress

Lecturers

• Thomas Chrowder Chamberlin (1843–1928), geologist, professor 1873–1882
• George Ellery Hale (1868–1938), astronomer, professor 1891–1893
• Lewis L. Lorwin (1883–1970), economist and sociologist, professor 1920–1925
• Henry Bradford Nason (1835–1895), chemist and geologist, professor 1858–1866
• John Ostrom (1928-2005), geologist, professor 1960-1965
• Theodore Lyman Wright (1858–1926), classical philologist and art historian, professor 1888–1926

President of the College

Presidents of the college have been:

1. Aaron Lucius Chapin , 1849-1886
2. Edward Dwight Eaton , 1886-1917
3. Melvin Amos Brannon , 1917-1923
4. Irving Maurer , 1924–1942
5. Carey Croneis , 1944-1954
6. Miller Upton , 1954-1975
7. Martha Peterson , 1975-1981
8. Roger Hull , 1981-1990
9. Victor E. Ferrall , 1991-2000
10. John E. Burris , 2000-2008
11. Scott Bierman , since 2009

literature

• Henry Mitchell Whitney: A history of Beloit College and a sketch of Aaron L. Chapin, one of its founders and president from 1850 to 1886 . Beloit 1893
• Edward Dwight Eaton: Historical Sketches of Beloit College . New York 1928

Web links

Commons : Beloit College  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Official website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Admissions: Fast Facts . Retrieved May 6, 2015.
2. ↑ Beloit College Archives: Information on Aaron Lucius Chapin , accessed May 4, 2015.
3. ↑ Until 2007, Beloit College was still included in a list of UCC-related colleges and universities , cf. UCC.org (in the Wayback Machine archive) ( January 9, 2007 memento on the Internet Archive ), accessed May 4, 2015.
4. ↑ Logan Museum of Anthropology: History , accessed May 6, 2015.
5. ^ Wright Museum of Art: Mission & History , accessed May 6, 2015.
6. ^ Beloit College Archives: Theodore Lyman Wright Art Hall , accessed May 6, 2015.
7. ↑ Beloit College: Information on the subject Critical Identity Studies (English) , accessed on May 6, 2015.
8. ↑ Beloit College Academics: Majors , accessed May 6, 2015.
9. ↑ Beloit College Academics: Opportunities , accessed May 6, 2015.
10. ↑ Beloit College Archives: Beloit College Presidents , accessed May 4, 2015.

Coordinates: 42 ° 30 '17.3 "  N , 89 ° 1' 49.4"  W.