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University of New Hampshire

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University of New Hampshire
MottoScience, Arts, Industry
TypeFlagship
Public
Sea grant
Space grant
Established1866
Endowment$284,630,000[1]
PresidentMark W. Huddleston (19th)
Undergraduates11,113
Postgraduates2,434
Location
Durham
,
New Hampshire
,
USA
Campussuburban
ColorsUNH Blue, White
NicknameWildcats
MascotWild E. Cat, Gnarlz
Websitewww.unh.edu

University of New Hampshire (UNH) is a public university in the University System of New Hampshire (USNH), United States. The main campus is in Durham, New Hampshire. The sixth college of the University, University of New Hampshire at Manchester, is located in Manchester. With over 15,000 students, UNH is the largest university in New Hampshire. The University is one of only nine land, sea and space grant institutions in the nation. Since July 1, 2007, Mark W. Huddleston has served as the university's 19th president.

In 2004, UNH was the only public institution in New England to rank in the top 10 of number of Fulbright fellowships awarded, with five graduates receiving grants.

History

Thompson Hall, built in 1892

In 1866, the university was first incorporated as the New Hampshire College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts in Hanover, New Hampshire, in association with Dartmouth College. Durham resident Benjamin Thompson left his farm and assets to the state for the establishment of an agricultural college. On January 30 1890, Benjamin Thompson died and his will became public. On March 5, 1891 Gov. Hiram Americus Tuttle signed an act accepting the conditions of Thompson's will. On April 10 1891, Gov. Tuttle signed a bill authorizing the college's move to Durham, New Hampshire.

In 1892, the Board of Trustees hired Charles Eliot to draw a site plan for the first five campus buildings: Thompson, Conant, Nesmith, and Hewitt Shops (now called Halls) and the Dairy Barn. Eliot visited Durham and worked for three months to create a plan prior to the move to Durham. The Class of 1892, excited about the pending move to Durham, held commencement exercises in an unfinished barn on the Durham campus. On April 18 1892, the Board of Trustees voted to "authorize the faculty to make all the arrangements for the packing and removal of college property at Hanover to Durham." The Class of 1893, followed the previous class and held commencement exercises in unfinished Thompson Hall, the Romanesque Revival campus centerpiece designed by the prominent Concord architectural firm of Dow & Randlett.

In Fall 1893, classes officially began in Durham with 51 freshmen and 13 upperclassmen, which was three times the projected enrollment. Graduate study was also established in Fall 1893 for the first time. The number of students and the lack of state funds for dormitories caused a housing crunch, and forced students to find housing in town. The lack of housing caused difficulty for attracting women to the university. In 1908, construction on Smith Hall, the first women's dorm, was completed using private and state funds. Prior to the construction of Fairchild Hall in 1915 for male students, 50 freshmen lived in the basement of DeMerritt Hall. With the continuing housing shortage for men, the administration encouraged the growth of the UNH Greek system. From the late 1910s through the 1930s, the fraternity system expanded and provided room and board for male students.

In 1923, Gov. Fred Herbert Brown signed a bill changing the name of the college to "University of New Hampshire", despite pressure by state agriculture interests that had defeated a similar proposal in 1911.

Academics

UNH is composed of six colleges and the Graduate School, offering some 2,000 courses in over 100 majors. The Thompson School of Applied Science (TSAS), first established in 1895 and now a division of COLSA, provides seven different associate degrees in applied science.

Morrill Hall in c. 1920

The six colleges of UNH are:

The University is a member of the New England Board of Higher Education's New England Regional Student Program (NERSP) where New England public universities and colleges offer a number of undergraduate curricula with special considerations to students from other New England states. If an out of state student's home state schools do not offer a certain degree program offered by UNH, that student can receive the in-state tuition rate plus 75% if enrolled in the program.

Pettee Hall in c. 2005

The coastal proximity of the university affords excellent programs in marine biology and oceanography. Facilities include the Jackson Estuarine Laboratory at Adam's Point in Durham, and the Shoals Marine Laboratory jointly operated with Cornell University on Appledore Island in the Isles of Shoals.

The University boasts three main university-wide undergraduate research programs: Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP), Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF), and International Research Opportunities Program (IROP).

The University offers many opportunities for students to study abroad through managed programs, exchange programs and approved programs. As of Fall 2004, there were 561 students (4% of the student body) studying in 38 different countries. The University runs/manages twenty-two study abroad programs, which include: Salzburg, Austria; Canada; Cambridge, England; London, England; Edinburgh, Scotland; Brest, France; Dijon, France; Grenoble, France; Budapest, Hungary; Osaka, Japan; The Hague, Netherlands; Maastricht, Netherlands; New Zealand; India, South Africa, Italy, Kenya, and Granada, Spain. The University also accepts credit from over 300 approved programs that are run through other institutions. The University organizes an annual summer abroad program at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge University. There are also over 100 National Exchange Program opportunities.

Activities

The University has approximately 200 student organizations grouped by: academics & careers, community service, political and world affairs, arts & entertainment, culture & language, fraternities & sororities, hall councils, honor societies, leisure & recreation, media & publications, religious, special interest, student activism. A listing of these groups can be found at the SOS website Of those groups there are 13 undergraduate groups which receive Student Activity Fee funds to help subsidize the services they provide; such as the Campus Activity Board, Diversity Support Coalition, Memorial Union Student Organization, The Granite yearbook, SCAN TV, Student Committee of Popular Entertainment, Non-Traditional Student Organization, Student Senate, The New Hampshire, and WUNH. The New Hampshire Outing Club, the oldest and largest club on campus, offers trips into the outdoors each weekend.

Engineering

Mechanical Engineering students have the opportunity to get involved in the following projects and extracurricular activities:

 

A number of Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, and Computer Science students work at the InterOperability Laboratory, which tests networking and data communications products. The IOL accepts students from all majors.

Greek life

Approximately 8% of undergraduate students are affiliated with fraternities and sororities recognized by the University. The Office of Greek Life, the Interfraternity Council, and Panhellenic Council oversee the eight recognized social fraternities and five recognized social sororities. The fraternities and sororities have houses located on "Frat Row," which is the stretch of Madbury Road, Garrison and Strafford Avenues in Durham. Currently, fraternities and sororities are not owned by or on University property.

Fraternities and Societies

 

Sororities

Unrecognized Groups

Currently, three unrecognized groups exist in Durham. These groups, Chi Phi Alpha, Zeta Chi Beta, and Phi Kappa Theta, maintain no relationship with the university, and therefore do not receive any resources or support from UNH. These groups are also not affiliated with the Inter fraternity Council.

Music

UNH offers two undergraduate degree programs: the bachelor of arts in music and the bachelor of music; and two graduate degree programs: the master of arts in music, and the master of arts in teaching. The department also offers the following groups for one academic credit:

Instrumental

 

Vocal

 

A cappella - not associated with music dept

Athletics

File:NewHampshireWildcats.png
Main article: New Hampshire Wildcats

The school's athletic teams are the Wildcats, and they compete in the NCAA Division I. UNH is a member of the America East Conference for basketball, cross country, track and field, skiing, soccer, swimming & diving and tennis; and women's crew, field hockey, lacrosse, and volleyball. They also compete in Hockey East in men's and women's ice hockey, as well as the Colonial Athletic Association for football at the Division I-AA level.

In the 2006 academic year the University cut women's crew, men's swimming & diving, and men's and women's tennis at the varsity level, and trimmed the size of the men's ski team from 27 to 12. The reason given was the Athletic Department would save $500,000 towards a $1,000,000 budget shortfall, and be in compliance with Title IX for the first time.[14] In 1997, the University cut baseball, softball, men's and women's golf, and men's lacrosse.

In addition to varsity athletics, the University offers many club sports through the Department of Campus Recreation, including Aikido, Archery, Baseball, Crew, Cycling, Dance, Fencing, Figure Skating, Golf, Lacrosse, Nordic Skiing, Rugby, Sailing, Softball, Tennis, Taekwondo, Wrestling, and the Woodsmen Club. Many of these clubs compete either on an intercollegiate basis with New England teams, or sponsor University tournaments and frequently participate in National Championships. UNH also offers horseback riding as a recreation. Many students can take horseback riding lessons with instructors, on their horse or the schools. UNH holds many events each year, for they have a large cross country course. UNH also has a Dressage team that competes yearly.

The school's official colors are blue and white. The school's official mascot is the Wildcat and its uniformed mascot is known as "Wild E. Cat."

The recognized fight song of UNH is "On to Victory," the most current version of which was arranged by Tom Keck, Director of Athletic Bands from 1998-2003. In 2003, "UNH Cheer (originally titled "Cheer Boys")" was resurrected from the University archives by Erika Svanoe, former Director of Athletic Bands. Based on the school song "Old New Hampshire", not to be confused with the New Hampshire state song of the same name, "UNH Cheer" currently serves as a secondary fight song and is often performed immediately following "On to Victory."

On October 7 2006, Wildcats wide receiver David Ball tallied the fifty-first receiving touchdown of his career to displace Jerry Rice of Mississippi Valley State University, who was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame a month earlier, atop the ranking of NCAA Division I and I-AA players by career receiving touchdowns. He later signed as a rookie free agent with the Chicago Bears, he played with well known college football players Chris Leak and Darius Walker.

Demographics

Commencement ceremonies at the University of New Hampshire, on May 19, 2007.

As of the Fall 2005 semester, the university had 13,544 undergraduate students and 2,481 graduate students enrolled in more than 100 majors. The university is 61% in-state students, 38% out-of-state students and 2% international students; and is 57% female and 43% male. The administration is also making a push to increase and promote diversity.

Durham campus

Congreve Hall

University of New Hampshire is located in the town of Durham, New Hampshire and has a "traditional New England campus."

The Durham campus is 1,100 acres (4.5 km2), with 300 acres (1.2 km2) in the "campus core" and 800 acres (3.2 km2) of open land on the west edge of campus. The campus core is considered to be the university property within a 10-minute walk from Thompson Hall, the symbolic and near-geographic center of campus. The campus core contains many of the academic and residential buildings, while the outer campus contains much of the agriculture land and buildings. The University owns a total of 2,450 acres (9.9 km2) of land.

Housing

Smith Hall in c. 1915

The University currently by agreement offers all underclassmen the opportunity to live in University Housing. As of 2004, the University housed 50 percent of undergraduate students. The University's Campus Master Plan envisions housing about 60 percent of undergraduates, requiring an addition of 1700 beds.

Babcock Hall

Undergraduate housing is divided into three areas: Area I, Area II and Area III. In addition there are two undergraduate apartments, The Gables and Woodside Apartments. The University also offers family housing in the Forest Park apartments and graduate housing in Babcock Hall.

For the Fall 2006 semester, two new buildings at The Gables, North and South were opened, providing an additional 400 beds. In Summer 2006, one-half of Forest Park was demolished to make way for two new buildings (A & B) of the Southeast Residential Community (SERC). Buildings A and B provide housing for 492 students beginning Fall 2007. Two existing Mini Dorms were demolished during Summer 2007, to build a third building of SERC, which is scheduled to provide housing for 235 students beginning in Fall 2008. Plans exist to provide 781 new beds by demolishing the remaining 9 buildings (98 units) in Forest Park. Later plans call for the construction of a new 170-unit graduate housing facility at a location to be determined.

Due to the over-enrollment of the 2006-2007 academic year, the university offered students who intended to live in campus housing a free parking pass for the academic year, credit in UNH "Dining Dollars" and a refund of the housing deposit given that the student withdrew their intentions to live on campus. The incentive was designed to free up space for the large incoming freshman class.

National Historic Chemical Landmark

Conant Hall was dedicated as a National Historic Chemical Landmark — the first in New Hampshire. Conant Hall was the first chemistry building on the Durham campus, and it was the headquarters of the American Chemical Society from 1907-1911, when Charles Parsons was the society’s secretary. In addition, from 1906-1928, the hall housed the laboratories of Charles James, who was an innovative developer of separation and analytical methods for compounds of rare earth elements.

He is particularly well known for the James Method for separation of rare earths by fractional recrystallization of their double magnesium nitrate salts. James has also been credited (with Urbain and von Welsbach) for the independent discovery of the element lutetium. This is the only element discovered (as opposed to synthesized) on American soil. James Hall, the second chemistry building on campus, was, of course, named for (and designed by) Charles James.

Notable faculty

  • Andrew Boysen, composer, Assistant Professor of Music, Director of Bands
  • Grant Drumheller, painter, Professor of Art
  • Mary Goldsmith, Artist-in-resident emeritus
  • Meredith Hall, author of New York Times Bestseller "Without a Map", Lecturer of English
  • Robert LeBlanc, Professor Emeritus of Geography, 9/11 victim (United Airlines Flight 175)
  • Joshua Meyrowitz, author of "No Sense of Place" , Professor of Communication
  • Donald Murray, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Professor Emeritus of English
  • Thomas Newkirk, author of "Misreading Masculinity: Boys, Literacy, and Popular Culture," Professor of English
  • Edwin Scheier, noted American sculptor, Fine art professor emeritus
  • Charles Simic, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, Professor of English
  • Andrew Smith, Polling and political adviser for the Boston Globe, Professor of Political Science
  • Clark Terry, jazz trumpeter, Affiliate Faculty, Department of Music

Notable alumni

Science, business, and industry

Diplomacy, government, and politics

Governors of New Hampshire

Athletics

Ice hockey

Football

Other sports

Baseball
Field hockey
Skiing

Writers and journalists

Actors

Music

Visual arts

Television

Attractions

References

  1. ^ "College and University Endowments Over $250-Million, 2007". Chronicle of Higher Education. 2008-08-29. p. 28. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
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