The university's 169-acre Danforth Campus is the academic home to the majority of the university’s undergraduate, graduate, and professional students, which features predominantly Collegiate Gothic-style architecture in its academic buildings and is bordered by the Forest Park section of St. Louis and Clayton and University City, Missouri. The university's West Campus is located in Clayton and its North Campus is in the West End section of St. Louis. Its Medical Campus in the Central West End section of St. Louis[9] spans over 17 city blocks and 164 acres and houses the Washington University School of Medicine and its affiliated hospitals, clinics, patient care centers and research facilities.
Washington University has been a member of the Association of American Universities since 1923 and is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity".[13][14] The National Science Foundation ranked the university 28th among academic institutions in the United States for research and development (R&D) expenditures.[15] As of 2022, 26 Nobel laureates in economics, physiology and medicine, chemistry, and physics have been affiliated with Washington University, 11 having done the major part of their pioneering research at the university.[16][17]
Washington University was conceived by 17 St. Louis business, political, and religious leaders concerned by the lack of institutions of higher learning in the Midwest.[18] Missouri State Senator Wayman Crow and Unitarian minister William Greenleaf Eliot, grandfather of the poet T.S. Eliot, led the effort.
The university's first chancellor was Joseph Gibson Hoyt. Crow secured the university charter from the Missouri General Assembly in 1853, and Eliot was named President of the Board of Trustees. Early on, Eliot solicited support from members of the local business community, including John O'Fallon, but Eliot failed to secure a permanent endowment. Washington University is unusual among major American universities in not having had a prior financial endowment. The institution had no backing of a religious organization, single wealthy patron, or earmarked government support. To this day, Washington University is controlled by a Board of Trustees that, by charter, appoints its own members.[19]
During the three years following its inception, the university bore three different names. The board first approved "Eliot Seminary", but William Eliot was uncomfortable with naming a university after himself and objected to the establishment of a seminary which would implicitly be charged with teaching a religious faith. He favored a nonsectarian university.[20]
Under pressure from Eliot, the Board of Trustees created a task force charged with naming the university, headed by Samuel Treat. Several months later Treat's committee proposed naming the university the Washington Institute, after the nation's first president George Washington. In 1854, the board of trustees changed the name to "Washington Institute" in honor of George Washington and because the charter was coincidentally passed on Washington's birthday, February 22.[21] Naming the university after the nation's first president, only seven years before the American Civil War and during a time of bitter national division, was no coincidence. During this time of conflict, Americans universally admired George Washington as the father of the United States and a symbol of national unity. The board believed that the university should be a force of unity in a strongly divided Missouri. In 1856, the university amended its name to "Washington University". The university amended its name once more in 1976, when the board voted to add the suffix "in St. Louis" to distinguish the university from the over two dozen other universities bearing Washington's name.[12]
Although chartered as a university, for many years Washington University functioned primarily as a night school located on 17th Street and Washington Avenue in downtown St. Louis. Owing to limited financial resources, Washington University initially used public buildings. Classes began on October 22, 1854, at the Benton School building. At first the university paid for the evening classes, but as their popularity grew, their funding was transferred to the St. Louis Public Schools.[22] Eventually the board secured funds for the construction of Academic Hall and a half dozen other buildings. Later the university divided into three departments: the Manual Training School, Smith Academy, and the Mary Institute.
In 1867, the university opened the first private nonsectarian law school west of the Mississippi River. By 1882, Washington University had expanded to numerous departments, which were housed in various buildings across St. Louis. Medical classes were first held at Washington University in 1891 after the St. Louis Medical College decided to affiliate with the university, establishing the School of Medicine. However, by the 1890s the university was on the brink of financial collapse until Robert Sommers Brookings, president of the Board of Trustees, undertook the task of rebuilding the university's finances and acquiring land for a new campus. Brookings was instrumental in raising money for the university, since Eliot, the primary fundraiser for the university, had died.
In 1896, Holmes Smith, professor of Drawing and History of Art, designed what would become the basis for the modern-day university seal. The seal is made up of elements from the Washington family coat of arms and the symbol of Louis IX, whom the city is named after.[23]
Washington University spent its first half century in downtown St. Louis bounded by Washington Ave., Lucas Place, and Locust Street. By the 1890s, owing to the dramatic expansion of the medical school and a new benefactor in Robert Brookings, the university began to move west. The university board of directors began a process to find suitable ground and hired the landscape architecture firm Olmsted, Olmsted & Eliot of Boston. A committee of Robert S. Brookings, Henry Ware Eliot, and William Huse found a site of 103 acres (41.7ha) just beyond Forest Park, located west of the city limits in St. Louis County. The elevation of the land was thought to resemble the Acropolis and inspired the nickname of "Hilltop" campus, renamed the Danforth campus in 2006 to honor former chancellor William H. Danforth.[24]
The cornerstone of the first building, Busch Hall, was laid on October 20, 1900. The construction of Brookings Hall, Ridgley, and Cupples began shortly thereafter.[27]
The university delayed occupying these buildings until 1905 to accommodate the 1904 World's Fair and 1904 Summer Olympics, which allowed the university to construct ten buildings instead of the seven originally planned. This original cluster of buildings set a precedent for the development of the Danforth Campus; Cope and Stewardson's original plan and its choice of building materials have, with few exceptions, guided the construction and expansion of the Danforth Campus to the present day.[26]
By 1915, construction of a new medical complex was completed on Kings Highway in what is now St. Louis's Central West End. In 1918, Washington University admitted its first women medical students.[28]
In 1922, Arthur Holly Compton, a physics professor, conducted a series of experiments in the basement of Eads Hall that demonstrated the particle concept of electromagnetic radiation. Compton's discovery, known as the "Compton Effect," earned him the Nobel Prize in physics in 1927.[29]
After working for 22 years at the University of Chicago, Compton returned to St. Louis in 1946 to serve as Washington University's ninth chancellor.[31] Compton reestablished the Washington University football team, making the declaration that athletics were to be henceforth played on a "strictly amateur" basis with no athletic scholarships. Under Compton's leadership, enrollment at the university grew dramatically, fueled primarily by World War II veterans' use of their GI Bill benefits.[32]
In 1947, Gerty Cori, a professor at the School of Medicine, became the first woman to win a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. Professors Carl and Gerty Cori became Washington University's fifth and sixth Nobel laureates for their discovery of how glycogen is broken down and resynthesized in the body.[33]
The desegregation of Washington University began in 1947 with the School of Medicine and the School of Social Work.[34] The university ended racial segregation in its undergraduate divisions in 1952, making it the last local higher education institution to do so. During the 1940s, the university faced criticism from the local African American media, which included a letter-writing campaign by churches, the local Urban League, and legal briefs by the NAACP, seeking to strip the university of its tax-exempt status.
In 1949, a student group, the Student Committee for the Admission of Negroes (SCAN), was founded and began advocating for full racial integration. In 1951, then-vice chancellor Leslie Buchan argued that full desegregation would isolate the university from the community and potentially lead to incidents on campus.[citation needed] The following year, in May 1952, the Board of Trustees passed a resolution desegregating the university's undergraduate divisions.[35]
During the latter half of the 20th century, Washington University transitioned from a strong regional university to a national research institution. In 1957, planning began for the construction of the "South 40", a complex of modern residential halls which primarily house freshmen and some sophomore students.[36]
With additional on-campus housing, the university, which had been predominantly attended by commuter students, began attracting a greater number of applicants from across the nation.[37] By 1964, over two-thirds of incoming students came from outside the St. Louis area.[38]
In 1971, the board of trustees appointed Chancellor William Henry Danforth, who guided the university through the social and financial crises of the 1970s and strengthened the university's often strained relationship with the St. Louis community. During his 24-year chancellorship, Danforth improved the School of Medicine, established 70 new faculty chairs, secured a $1.72 billion endowment, and tripled the amount of student scholarships.[39]
In 1995, Mark S. Wrighton, former provost at MIT, was elected the university's 14th Chancellor. During Chancellor Wrighton's tenure undergraduate applications to Washington University more than doubled. Since 1995, the university has added more than 190 endowed professorships, revamped its Arts & Sciences curriculum, and completed more than 30 new buildings.[40]
Washington University's reputation was enhanced by two major fundraising efforts since the 1980s. From 1983 to 1987, the "Alliance for Washington University" campaign raised $630.5 million, which was then the most successful fund-raising effort in national history.[41] From 1998 to 2004, the "Campaign for Washington University" raised $1.55 billion, which was applied to additional scholarships, professorships, and research initiatives.[42]
The campus was the venue for four Presidential debates, and one Vice-Presidential debate: the first 1992 Presidential debate on October 11, 1992, the third 2000 Presidential debate on October 17, 2000, the second 2004 Presidential debate on October 8, 2004, the 2008 Vice-Presidential debate on October 2, and the second 2016 Presidential debate on October 9, 2016.[43] The university was scheduled to host a debate in 1996, but that debate was cancelled when the number of scheduled debates was scaled back to two.[44]
In 2005, Washington University founded the McDonnell International Scholars Academy, an international network of premier research universities, with an initial endowment gift of $10 million from John F. McDonnell.[49][50] The academy, which selects scholars from 35 partnered universities around the world, was created to develop a cohort of future leaders, strengthen ties with top foreign universities, and promote global awareness and social responsibility.[51][52]
In Fall 2006, the St. Louis Metro opened the Cross–County extension of its light railMetroLink system. Three of the nine new stations directly serve the university (Skinker, University City-Big Bend, and Forsyth). On July 1, 2006, the university began offering free Metro passes—the U Pass—to all full-time students, benefits-eligible faculty and staff, and full-time employees of qualified service providers.[53]
In 2019, Washington University unveiled a $360 million campus transformation project known as the "East End Transformation". The transformation project, built on the original 1895 campus plan by Olmsted, Olmsted & Eliot, encompassed 18 acres of the Danforth Campus, adding five new buildings, expanding the university's Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, relocating hundreds of surface parking spaces underground, and creating an expansive new park.[54]
In June 2019, Andrew D. Martin, former dean of the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts at the University of Michigan, was elected the university's 15th chancellor.[55] On the day of his inauguration, Martin announced the "WashU Pledge", a financial aid program allowing full-time Missouri and southern Illinois students who are Pell Grant-eligible or from families with annual incomes of $75,000 or less to attend the university cost-free.[56][57]
In October 2021, Washington University announced it would invest an additional $1 billion in financial aid for students. The university practices need-blind admissions and meets 100% of admitted students' demonstrated needs.[58] The new financial aid initiative, called Gateway to Success, included $800 million in endowed funding to support need-blind undergraduate admissions, meaning the university will not consider an applicant's financial situation when making admissions decisions while still meeting 100% of demonstrated financial need for admitted undergraduates.[59] Another $200 million will be designated for financial aid for graduate and professional students in the university's Brown School, the School of Law and the School of Medicine, as well as in business, engineering, art and architecture, and Arts & Sciences.[58]
In 2022, Washington University was one of 10 universities picked to join the Kessler Scholars National Collaborative, which provides support for selected first-generation and Pell-Grant eligible STEM students who hope to improve society. The program aims to recruit 20 fully-funded Kessler scholars per year and provide additional opportunities to close the wealth gap.[60] Also, in 2022, Washington University developed a needle-free nasal vaccine to combat COVID-19.[61]
Washington University has been selected by the Commission on Presidential Debates to host more presidential and vice-presidential debates than any other institution in history.[62]United States presidential election debates were held at the Washington University Athletic Complex in 1992, 2000, 2004, and 2016. A presidential debate was planned to occur in 1996, but owing to scheduling difficulties between the candidates, the debate was canceled.[63] The university hosted the only 2008 vice presidential debate, between RepublicanSarah Palin and DemocratJoe Biden, on October 2, 2008, also at the Washington University Athletic Complex. The university hosted the second 2016 presidential debate, between Republican Party candidate Donald Trump and Democratic Party candidate Hillary Clinton, on October 9, 2016.[64][65]
Following the 2004 debate, Wrighton said that it would be "improbable" that the university will host another debate,[66] but subsequently changed his view, and the university submitted a bid for the 2008 debates.[67] "These one-of-a-kind events are great experiences for our students, they contribute to a national understanding of important issues, and they allow us to help bring national and international attention to the St. Louis region as one of America's great metropolitan areas," said Wrighton.[68]
The university decided not to host a 2020 presidential debate, against the majority opinion of the student body.[69]
The main, or Danforth Campus (formerly known as the Hilltop Campus) is mostly between Forest Park Parkway, Wydown Boulevard, North Big Bend Boulevard, and North Skinker Boulevard.
Although the school includes "St. Louis" in its name, the majority of the school's main campus is located in unincorporatedSt. Louis County and suburban Clayton.
The Barry Flanagan bronze statue, "Thinker on a Rock," widely known, simply, as "The Bunny", is currently on permanent loan to Washington University and features prominently near Olin Library, Graham Chapel and Mallinckrodt.
Danforth University Center (DUC): Completed in 2008, it occupies the space where Prince Hall once stood and is the main student center on campus. The three-story, 116,000sqft building features dining areas, lounges, meeting rooms, and offices for student leaders and student services professional staff. Housed in the DUC is the Career Center, the Student Union student government, Student Life newspaper, WUTV, a recording studio for KWUR, the Graduate Center, and other on-campus groups.
Gephardt Institute for Civic and Community Engagement: Founded with a major gift from former U.S. Congressman Richard Gephardt. Focuses on the value, interest and importance of public service and civic engagement. Major activities of the Gephardt Institute include the hosting of speakers series, internship and career placement services, granting of money to faculty and students for community-based teaching and learning, supporting co-curricular activities with the community service office, and a summer stipend program, where the university financially supports students who take uncompensated internships in the field of public service.
International Center for Energy, Environment and Sustainability
Mallinckrodt Center: The central student center on the Danforth Campus. It houses the Campus Book Store, Computer Store, Dining Services, the Edison Theatre, the Division of Drama, the Division of Dance, and the Department of Performing Arts. WUTV is also housed inside.
Ridgley Hall: This served as the university's first library building until the early 1960s. During the 1904 World's Fair, Ridgley housed an exhibit of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee gifts. The former library reading room was transformed into an ornate lounge space, which today is known as Holmes Lounge. Ridgley Hall is also the home of several language departments, the Committee on Comparative Literature and the Language Lab.
In 2019, a $360 million renovation project, the "East End Transformation", was unveiled on the Danforth Campus, building on the original 1895 campus plan by Olmsted, Olmsted & Eliot. The project included the creation of the Gary M. Sumers Welcome Center, which now houses undergraduate admissions; the Craig and Nancy Schnuck Pavilion, which houses a café, the Environmental Studies program and the Office of Sustainability; the Henry A. and Elvira H. Jubel Hall, which houses the Department of Mechanical Engineering & Materials Science in the McKelvey School of Engineering; and the James M. McKelvey Sr. Hall, which will be completed in 2020 and open in 2021 and will house the McKelvey School of Engineering's Department of Computer Science & Engineering. All new buildings on the east end have been designed to achieve LEED-Gold certification, and include solar panels located on many of the roofs to generate renewable electricity. In addition to the five new buildings, the project relocated 6 acres of parking lots underground, renovated and expanded the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, and created the Ann and Andrew Tisch Park.[54]
In 2020, the Princeton Review ranked the Danforth Campus among the top 10 "Most Beautiful Campuses" in the United States.[72]
Medical Campus
The Medical Campus is accessible via the Central West End MetroLink station, which provides a quick link to the Danforth, North, and West Campuses. All full-time Washington University students and employees are eligible for a Metro Transit U-Pass, which grants access to use the MetroLink and Metro buses for free.[73]
The School's 2,100 employed and volunteer faculty physicians also serve as the medical staff of Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals, which are part of BJC HealthCare. Washington University and BJC have taken on many joint venture projects, such as the Center for Advanced Medicine, completed in December 2001.
In 2019, Washington University was awarded a $7.6 million grant from the National Cancer Institute to create the Implementation Science Center for Cancer Control to address disparities in cancer care in parts of Missouri and Illinois.[75] In 2022, Washington University's Institute of Clinical and Translational Sciences was awarded a five-year $61 million grant from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health, to focus on precision medicine, health equity, and diversity.[76]
BJC Institute of Health at Washington University is the newest research building with 680,000 square feet (63,000m2). In 2020, Washington University announced the construction of a new $616 million, 11 story, 609,000-square-foot neuroscience research building which will sit at the eastern edge of the Medical Campus in the Cortex Innovation Community. Construction of the building is set to be finished in 2023.[77]
Washington University's North Campus and West Campus principally house administrative functions that are not student focused. North Campus lies in St. Louis City near the Delmar Loop. The university acquired the building and adjacent property in 2004, formerly home to the Angelica Uniform Factory.[78] Several university administrative departments are located at the North Campus location, including offices for Quadrangle Housing, Accounting and Treasury Services, Parking and Transportation Services, Army ROTC, and Network Technology Services. The North Campus location also provides off-site storage space for the Performing arts Department. Renovations are still ongoing; recent additions to the North Campus space include a small eatery operated by Bon Appétit Management Company, the university's on-campus food provider, completed during spring semester 2007, as well as the Family Learning Center, operated by Bright Horizons and opened in September 2010.
The West Campus is located about one mile (1.6km) to the west of the Danforth Campus in Clayton, Missouri, and primarily consists of a four-story former department store building housing mostly administrative space. The West Campus building was home to the Clayton branch of the Famous-Barr department store until 1990, when the university acquired the property and adjacent parking and began a series of renovations.[79] Today, the basement level houses the West Campus Library, the University Archives, the Modern Graphic History Library, and conference space. The ground level still remains a retail space. The upper floors house consolidated capital gifts, portions of university advancement, and information systems offices from across the Danforth and Medical School campuses. There is also a music rehearsal room on the second floor.
Both the North and West Campuses are accessible by the St. Louis MetroLink, which, with the Delmar Loop and Forsyth MetroLink Stations directly adjacent to these campuses, provides easy travel around the St. Louis metropolitan area, including all of Washington University's campuses.
Tyson Research Center is a 1,966.5-acre (3.07sqmi; 795.81ha) field station located west of St. Louis on the Meramec River. Washington University obtained Tyson as surplus property from the federal government in 1963. It is used by the university as a biological field station and research/education center. In 2010, the Living Learning Center was named one of the first two buildings accredited nationwide as a "living building" under the Living Building Challenge,[80] opened to serve as a biological research station and classroom for summer students.
Holmes Lounge, the central reading room on campus, where students may study
Arts & Sciences is home to the College of Arts & Sciences as well as graduate programs across its many departments. Feng Sheng Hu is the Dean of the Faculty of Arts & Sciences.[81]
The College of Arts & Sciences is the central undergraduate unit of the university with 330 tenured and tenure-track faculty along with over 100 research scientists, lecturers, artists in residence, and visitors serving more than 3,700 undergraduates in 40 academic departments divided into divisions of Humanities, Social sciences, and Natural sciences and Mathematics. The College of Arts & Sciences has an average class size of 18 students, with over 80% having fewer than 24. Almost one-half of the undergraduate classes have fewer than 10 students. The student-faculty ratio is 7:1.[2]
The College of Arts & Sciences offers courses in over a dozen languages, including Arabic, Hebrew, Spanish, German, French, Swahili, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Greek, Italian, Hindi, Portuguese, and Latin. University College in Arts & Sciences also offers course work in Swedish, Vietnamese, Irish, and Czech.
Founded as the School of Commerce and Finance in 1917, the Olin Business School was named after entrepreneur John M. Olin in 1988. The school's academic programs include BSBA, MBA, Professional MBA (PMBA), Executive MBA (EMBA), MS in finance, MS in supply chain management, MS in customer analytics, Master of Accounting, Global Master of Finance Dual Degree program, and Doctorate programs, as well as non-degree Executive Education. In 2002, an Executive MBA program was established in Shanghai, in cooperation with Fudan University.
Olin has a network of more than 16,000 alumni worldwide.[82] Over the last several years, the school's endowment has increased to $213 million (2004) and annual gifts average $12 million per year.[83] Simon Hall was opened in 1986 after a donation from John E. Simon. On May 2, 2014, the $90 million conjoined Knight and Bauer Halls were dedicated, following a $15 million gift from Charles F. Knight and Joanne Knight and a $10 million gift from George and Carol Bauer through the Bauer Foundation. The two buildings are joined by a three-story-high atrium and include spaces for lectures, faculty offices, and classrooms. The café at Bauer Hall includes the only on-campus Starbucks.
In October 2019, Olin Business School ranked #1 on Inc.com's Best Business Schools for Entrepreneurship.[84] In January 2020, Olin was named the Poets&Quants MBA Program of 2019.[85]
Undergraduate BSBA students take 40–60% of their courses within the business school and are able to formally declare majors in eight areas: accounting, entrepreneurship, finance, healthcare management, marketing, managerial economics and strategy, organization and human resources, International Business, and operations and supply chain management. Graduate students are able to pursue an MBA either full-time or part-time. Students may also take elective courses from other disciplines at Washington University, including law and many other fields. Mark P. Taylor is the Dean of the Olin Business School.
The Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts was founded in 2006, merging the existing academic units of Architecture and Art with the university’s museum. The School comprises:
The McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis (WashU Engineering) is a school with 88 tenured and tenure-track professors, 40 additional full-time faculty, 1,300 undergraduate students, 560 master's students, 380 PhD students, and more than 20,000 alumni. Aaron Bobick serves as dean of the school.
With approximately $27 million in annual research awards, the school focuses intellectual efforts on medicine and health, energy and environment, entrepreneurship, and security. The school is ranked among the top 50 by the magazine U.S. News & World Report, and the biomedical engineering graduate program was ranked 12th by U.S. News & World Report in 2012–2013.
On January 31, 2019, the School of Engineering & Applied Science was renamed the James McKelvey School of Engineering, in honor of trustee and distinguished alumnus Jim McKelvey Jr., the co-founder of Square, after his donation of an undisclosed sum that the school's dean, Aaron Bobick, said has been the largest in the school's 162-year history.
Washington University School of Law offers joint-degree programs with the Olin Business School, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the School of Medicine, and the School of Social Work. It also offers an LLM in Intellectual Property and Technology Law, an LLM in Taxation, an LLM in US Law for Foreign Lawyers, a Master of Juridical Studies (MJS), and a Juris Doctoris (JD). The law school offers 3 semesters of courses in the Spring, Summer, and Fall, and requires at least 85 credit hours of coursework for the JD. In the 2022 and 2021 U.S. News & World Report rankings, the law school ranked 16th nationally.[88] The law school offers a full-time day program, beginning in August, for the J.D. degree. The law school is located in Anheuser-Busch Hall (opened in 1997).
The Washington University School of Medicine was founded in 1891. In the 2021 U.S. News & World Report rankings of U.S. medical schools, it was ranked sixth for research[89] and tied for 31st for primary care.[90] The McDonnell Genome Institute (directed by Richard K. Wilson) is housed within the Washington University School of Medicine; it is one of three NIH-funded major DNA sequencing centers in the U.S. and played a significant role in the Human Genome Project.[91] In 2022, the Washington University School of Medicine was the third medical school in the United States that received the most NIH funding.[92][93]
With roots dating back to 1909 in the university's School of Social Economy, the George Warren Brown School of Social Work was founded in 1925. Brown's academic degree offerings include a Master of Social Work (MSW), a Master of Public Health (MPH), a PhD in Social Work, and a PhD in Public Health Sciences. It is currently ranked first among Master of Social Work programs in the United States.[94] The school was endowed by Bettie Bofinger Brown and named for her husband, George Warren Brown, a St. Louis philanthropist and co-founder of the Brown Shoe Company. The school was the first in the country to have a building for the purpose of social work education, and it is also a founding member of the Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health.
McDonnell International Scholars Academy
The McDonnell International Scholars Academy (MISA) is an alliance between universities that supports collaboration on research, development of joint educational opportunities, and joint research conferences.[95][96] The program is named after John F. McDonnell, who provided an initial $10 million gift to establish the academy in 2005.[97] MISA features a graduate-level endowed scholarship program for international students to study at Washington University.[98] Founded in 2005, the academy's core mission is to develop a community of future global leaders from partner institutions worldwide.[99] The program is believed to be the first of its kind in the United States.[100]
Founded as the Missouri Dental College in 1866, the Washington University School of Dental Medicine was the first dental school west of the Mississippi River[101] and the sixth dental school in the United States. The school closed in 1991.[102]
Seigle Hall, shared by the School of Law and the College of Arts and Sciences
Washington University's undergraduate program is ranked 24th in the nation in the 2023 U.S. News & World Report National Universities ranking,[111] and 11th by The Wall Street Journal in their 2018 rankings.[112] The university is ranked 22nd in the world for 2019 by the Academic Ranking of World Universities.[113] Undergraduate admission to Washington University is characterized by the Carnegie Foundation and U.S. News & World Report as "most selective".[14][114] The Princeton Review, in its 2020 edition, gave the university an admissions selectivity rating of 99 out of 99.[115] The acceptance rate for the class of 2026 (those entering in the fall of 2022) was 11.3%, with students selected from more than 33,000 applications. Of students admitted, 91 percent were in the top 10 percent of their class.[116]
The Princeton Review ranked Washington University first for Best College Dorms and third for Best College Food, Best-Run Colleges, and Best Financial Aid in its 2020 edition.[119] In its 2022 edition, Princeton Review also ranked Washington University as number 2 for "Top Entrepreneurship Under Ten Thousand Students", #1 for "Top Midwest Entreprenuerships", as a "Colleges That Create Futures" and of having a great quality of life.[120]Niche listed the university as the best college for architecture and the second-best college campus and college dorms in the United States in 2020.[121] The Washington University School of Medicine was ranked sixth for research by U.S. News & World Report in 2020 and has been listed among the top ten medical schools since the rankings were first published in 1987.[122] Additionally, U.S. News & World Report ranked the university's genetics and physical therapy as tied for first place.[123][124]QS World University Rankings ranked Washington University sixth in the world for anatomy and physiology in 2020.[125] In January 2020, Olin Business School was named the Poets&Quants MBA Program of 2019.[85] Washington University has also been recognized as the 12th best university employer in the country by Forbes.[126]
A 2014 study ranked Washington University #1 in the country for income inequality[129] About 22% of Washington University's students came from the top 1%, while only about 6% came from the bottom 60%.[130][131][132] In response to this, in 2015, university administration announced plans to increase the number of Pell-eligible recipients on campus from 6% to 13% by 2020,[133][134][135] and in 2019 15% of the university's student body was eligible for Pell Grants.[136] In October 2019, then newly inaugurated Chancellor Andrew D. Martin announced the "WashU Pledge", a financial aid program that provides a free undergraduate education to all full-time Missouri and Southern Illinois students who are Pell Grant-eligible or from families with annual incomes of $75,000 or less.[137]
The American Talent Initiative found Washington University had the highest Pell growth rate among 130 major universities between the 2015–16 and 2019–20 academic years.[138]
Virtually all faculty members at Washington University engage in academic research,[145] offering opportunities for both undergraduate and graduate students across the university's seven schools. Known for its interdisciplinarity and departmental collaboration, many of Washington University's research centers and institutes are collaborative efforts between many areas on campus.[146] More than 60% of undergraduates are involved in faculty research across all areas;[147] it is an institutional priority for undergraduates to be allowed to participate in advanced research. According to the Center for Measuring University Performance, it is considered to be one of the top 10 private research universities in the nation.[148] A dedicated Office of Undergraduate Research is located on the Danforth Campus and serves as a resource to post research opportunities, advise students in finding appropriate positions matching their interests, publish undergraduate research journals, and award research grants to make it financially possible to perform research.[149]
Brown Hall
According to the National Science Foundation, Washington University spent $920 million on research and development in 2020, ranking it 28th in the nation.[150] The university has over 150 National Institutes of Health funded inventions, with many of them licensed to private companies. Governmental agencies and non-profit foundations such as the NIH, United States Department of Defense, National Science Foundation, and NASA provide the majority of research grant funding, with Washington University being one of the top recipients in NIH grants from year-to-year. Nearly 80% of NIH grants to institutions in the state of Missouri went to Washington University alone in 2007.[151] Washington University and its Medical School play a large part in the Human Genome Project, where it contributes approximately 25% of the finished sequence.[152] The Genome Sequencing Center has decoded the genome of many animals, plants, and cellular organisms, including the platypus, chimpanzee, cat, and corn.[153]
NASA hosts its Planetary Data System Geosciences Node on the campus of Washington University. Professors, students, and researchers have been heavily involved with many unmanned missions to Mars. Professor Raymond Arvidson has been deputy principal investigator of the Mars Exploration Rover mission and co-investigator of the Phoenix lander robotic arm.[154]
Washington University professor Joseph Lowenstein, with the assistance of several undergraduate students, has been involved in editing, annotating, making a digital archive of the first publication of poet Edmund Spenser's collective works in 100 years. A large grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities was given to support this project centralized at Washington University with support from other colleges in the United States.[155]
With 12 libraries, the Washington University library system is the largest in the state of Missouri, containing over 4.2 million volumes.[159] The main library, Olin Library, is centrally located on the Danforth Campus. In 2020, the Princeton Review ranked the Olin Library among the top 10 "Best College Libraries" in the United States.[160] The other 11 libraries in the system include:
Washington University has over 300 undergraduate student organizations on campus.[163] Most are funded by the Washington University Student Union, which, as of fiscal year 2020, has an annual budget of $3.6[164] million that is completely student-controlled and is one of the largest student government budgets in the country. Known as SU for short, the Student Union sponsors large-scale campus programs including WILD (a semesterly concert in the quad) and free copies of the New York Times, USA Today, and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch through The Collegiate Readership Program; it also funds the campus television station, WUTV, and the radio station, KWUR. KWUR was named best radio station in St. Louis of 2003 by the Riverfront Times despite the fact its signal reaches only a few blocks beyond the boundaries of the campus.[165] The Congress of the South 40 (CS40) is a Residential Life and Events Programming Board, which operates outside of the SU sphere. CS40's funding comes from the housing activities fee of each student living in the South 40.
Many of these organizations and other campus life amenities are housed in the $43 million Danforth University Center on the Danforth Campus, also dedicated in honor of the Danforth family.[166] The building opened on August 11, 2008, and earned LEED Gold certification for its environmentally friendly design.[167]
McMillan Hall
Washington University has a large number of student-run musical groups on campus, including 13 official a cappella groups. The Pikers, an all-male group, is the oldest such group on campus. The Greenleafs, an all-female group is the oldest (and only) female group on campus. The Mosaic Whispers, founded in 1991, is the oldest co-ed group on campus. They have produced 9 albums and have appeared on a number of compilation albums, including Ben Folds' Ben Folds Presents: University A Cappella! The Amateurs,[168] who also appeared on this album, is another co-ed a cappella group on campus, founded in 1991. They have recorded seven albums and toured extensively. After Dark[169] is a co-ed a cappella group founded in 2001. It has released three albums and has won several Contemporary A Capella Recording (CARA) awards. In 2008 the group performed on MSNBC during coverage of the vice presidential debate with specially written songs about Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.[170] The Ghost Lights, founded in 2010, is the campus's newest and only Broadway, Movies, and Television soundtrack group. They have performed multiple philanthropic concerts in the greater St. Louis area and were honored in November 2010 with the opportunity to perform for Nobel Laureate Douglass North at his birthday celebration. More Fools than Wise is a chamber jazz group, and The Aristocats feature Disney songs.
The campus newspaper is Student Life. The paper is published twice a week under the auspices of Washington University Student Media, Inc., an independent not-for-profit organization incorporated in 1999. The paper was first founded in 1878, making it one of the oldest student newspapers in the country.
Washington University has eleven fraternities and nine sororities on campus. In 2012, the chapter of Sigma Alpha Mu was closed following violations of drug and alcohol policies among students.[172] In 2020, a large number of Greek life members, primarily from sororities permanently deactivated from their chapters as a result of perceived systematic oppression, racism, and sexism. Some students called for the total abolition of Greek Life on campus.[173] As of Spring 2021, approximately 14% of the student body participated in Greek Life.[174]
Residences
The South 40
Washington University is number one on the Princeton Review's "Best College Dorms" list for 2020.[175]
Over 50% of undergraduate students live on campus.[176] Most of the residence halls on campus are located on the South 40, named because of its adjacent location on the south side of the Danforth Campus and its size of 40 acres (16ha). It is the location of all freshman buildings as well as several sophomore buildings, which are set up in the traditional residential college system. All of the residential halls are co-ed. The dormitories on the South 40 have grown national recognition for their large size and large number of amenities.[36] The South 40 is organized as a pedestrian-friendly environment wherein residences surround a central recreational lawn known as the Swamp. Bear's Den (the largest dining hall on campus), the Habif Health and Wellness Center (Student Health Services), the Residential Life Office, University police Headquarters, various student-owned businesses, and the baseball, softball, and intramural fields are also located on the South 40.
Another group of residences, known as the Village, is located in the northwest corner of Danforth Campus. Only open to upperclassmen and January Scholars, the North Side consists of Millbrook Apartments, The Village, Village East on-campus apartments, and all fraternity houses except the Zeta Beta Tau house, which is off campus and located just northwest of the South 40. Sororities at Washington University do not have houses by their own accord. The Village is a group of residences where students who have similar interests or academic goals apply as small groups of 4 to 24, known as BLOCs, to live together in clustered suites along with non-BLOCs. Like the South 40, the residences around the Village also surround a recreational lawn.
In addition to South 40 and North Side residence halls, Washington University owns several apartment buildings within walking distance to Danforth Campus, which are open to upperclassmen.
Student media
Washington University supports four major student-run media outlets. The university's student newspaper, Student Life, is available for students. KWUR (90.3 FM) serves as the students' official radio station; the station also attracts an audience in the immediately surrounding community due to its eclectic and free-form musical programming. WUTV is the university's closed-circuittelevision channel. The university's main student-run political publication is the Washington University Political Review (nicknamed "WUPR"), a self-described "multipartisan" monthly magazine. Washington University undergraduates publish two literary and art journals, The Eliot Review and Spires Intercollegiate Arts and Literary Magazine. A variety of other publications also serve the university community, ranging from in-house academic journals to glossy alumni magazines to WUnderground, the student-run satirical newspaper.[177]
Washington University's sports teams are called the Bears. They are members of the National Collegiate Athletic Association and participate in the University Athletic Association at the Division III level. The Bears have won 23 NCAA Division III Championships— two in women's cross country (2011, 2018), one in women's indoor track and field (2017), one in women's outdoor track and field (2017), one in men's tennis (2008), two in men's basketball (2008, 2009), five in women's basketball (1998–2001, 2010),[178] ten in women's volleyball (1989, 1991–1996, 2003, 2007, 2009),[179] and one in women's soccer (2016)[180] – and 217 UAA titles in 16 different sports.[181] The Athletic Department was headed by John Schael for 36 years, who served as director of athletics in the period 1978–2014.[182] The 2000 Division III Central Region winner of the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics/Continental Airlines Athletics Director of the Year award,[183] Schael helped orchestrate the Bears athletics transformation into one of the top departments in Division III.[183] Schael was succeeded by Josh Whitman, 2014–2016. The department is now led by Anthony J. Azama.
Washington University also has an extensive club sports program, with teams ranging from men's volleyball[184] to women's Ultimate Frisbee. The Washington University men's club water polo team has been particularly successful, capturing the Collegiate Water Polo Association Division III Club National Championship title in 2011, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019.[185][186] Funding for club sports comes from the Student Union budget, as each club is deemed a campus group.
Washington University is home of Francis Field, site of the 1904 Summer Olympics. Francis Field is also home of the Washington University football, soccer, and track and field teams.
Traditions
Gates at Francis Field
WILD – Walk In, Lay Down, the semesterly concert in the Quad which brings in popular musical acts.
Vertigo – A dance party put on by the Engineering School Council (EnCouncil), featuring an innovative 8-by-16-foot (2.4 by 4.9m) computer-controlled modular LED illuminated dance floor built by students.
Cultural shows – Each year Washington University student groups put on several multicultural shows. Ashoka, the South Asian student association, puts on a performance for Diwali, the Indian festival of lights, that includes a skit and dances. Black Anthology is a student-run performance arts show celebrating black culture. Lunar New Year Festival is a collaboration between the many East and Southeast Asian organizations on campus culminating in a show to celebrate the Asian and Asian American experience with a skit and performances from Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean cultures among others. Africa Week and the African Film Festival are annual events hosted by the African Students Association. Finally, the Association of Latin American Students showcases various forms of Latin and Spanish dances during their performance, Carnaval.
Brookings Hall – A superstition among students to never step on the university seal at Brookings Hall. It is said that doing so will prevent one from graduating on time.[190]
Convocation – A large gathering for new students and their families intended to welcome them to the university. Among others, it includes speeches from seniors and university leadership.[191]
DUC N’ Donuts – Taking place on the first Friday of every month at the Danforth University Center (DUC), this tradition allows students to learn about monthly events while enjoying free coffee and donuts.[190]
Cheap Lunch – Every Wednesday, the Engineering School Council (EnCouncil), provides pizza, chips, and cookies for a low cost.[192][193]
Art Prom – Every Spring, students from the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts host a “formal” dance with a creative twist.[194]
Underpass Panels – A series of panels along the walls of the underpass connecting the South 40 to the main Danforth Campus. Tradition involves the painting of each panel by students and clubs to advertise upcoming events. Located adjacent to the underpass is a large concrete ball, also painted to advertise student events.[195]
Washington University counts more than 156,000 living alumni, 29 Rhodes Scholars, and 26 Nobel laureates affiliated with the university as faculty or students.[196][197][17]
↑ The percentage of students who received an income-based federal Pell grant intended for low-income students.
↑ The percentage of students who are a part of the American middle class at the bare minimum.
Related Research Articles
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of modern technology and science.
Peking University is a national public comprehensive university in Beijing, China. The university is affiliated with and sponsored by the Ministry of Education of China. It is part of C9 League, Double First Class University Plan, former Project 985, and former Project 211.
The University of Massachusetts Lowell is a public research university in Lowell, Massachusetts, with a satellite campus in Haverhill, Massachusetts. It is the northernmost member of the University of Massachusetts public university system and has been accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education (NECHE) since 1975. With 1,110 faculty members and over 18,000 students, it is the largest university in the Merrimack Valley and the second-largest public institution in the state. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity".
Hartwick College is a private liberal arts college in Oneonta, New York. The institution's origin is rooted in the founding of Hartwick Seminary in 1797 through the will of John Christopher Hartwick. In 1927, the Seminary moved to expand into a four-year college and was offered land by the city of Oneonta to move to its current location. The college has 1,161 undergraduate students from 30 states and 22 countries, 187 faculty members, and a student-faculty ratio of 11:1.
Saint Louis University (SLU) is a private Jesuit research university with campuses in St. Louis, Missouri, United States, and Madrid, Spain. Founded in 1818 by Louis William Valentine DuBourg, it is the oldest university west of the Mississippi River and the second-oldest Jesuit university in the United States. The university is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission.
MICDS (Mary Institute and Saint Louis Country Day School) is a secular, co-educational, independent school home to more than 1,250 students ranging from grades Junior Kindergarten through 12. Its 110-acre (45 ha) campus is located in the St. Louis suburb of Ladue.
The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, usually referred to simply as the University of Athens (UoA), is a public university in Zografou, a suburban town in the Athens agglomeration, Greece.
William Henry Danforth II was an American physician, professor of medicine, academic administrator, and philanthropist. He was chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis from 1971 until 1995. Danforth was the grandson of Ralston-Purina founder and St. Louis businessman William H. Danforth, and the brother of former U.S. Senator John Danforth.
The Washington University School of Law (WashULaw) is the law school of Washington University in St. Louis, a private research university in St. Louis, Missouri. Founded in 1867, the law school was originally located in downtown St. Louis, and relocated in 1904 to the Danforth Campus of Washington University in St. Louis.
The Olin Business School is one of seven academic schools at Washington University in St. Louis. Founded in 1917, the business school was renamed for entrepreneur John M. Olin in 1988. The school offers BSBA, Master of Business Administration (MBA), MS in Supply Chain Management, MS in Finance, Masters in Accounting, MS in Business Analytics, MS in Leadership, Executive MBA, Doctor of Business in Finance (DBA) and PhD degrees. In 2002, an Executive MBA program was established in Shanghai, in cooperation with Fudan University and in 2017, along with IIT-Bombay started an EMBA program in India.
Washington University's origins were in seventeen St. Louis business, political, and religious leaders concerned by the lack of institutions of higher learning in the Midwest. The effort to found the university was spearheaded by Missouri State Senator Wayman Crow, and Unitarian minister William Greenleaf Eliot, grandfather of the Nobel Prize laureate poet T. S. Eliot. Its first chancellor was Joseph Gibson Hoyt. Crow secured the university charter from the Missouri State Legislature in 1853 and handled further political maneuvering. While Eliot was in charge of raising funds for the university, he accepted the position as President of the Board of Trustees. Early on Eliot was able to solicit some support from the local business community, including John O'Fallon, one of the wealthiest people in St. Louis, even briefly considering naming the university the O'Fallon Institute. However, Eliot failed in securing a permanent endowment. In fact Wash U is unique among other American universities, in not having any prior financial endowment to begin with; the school had no religious backing, wealthy patron, or government support. Therefore, financial problems plagued the university for several decades after its founding.
Arts & Sciences is home to the College of Arts & Sciences as well as graduate programs across its many departments. The current Dean of the Faculty is Feng Sheng Hu, the Lucille P. Markey Distinguished Professor in Arts & Sciences.
Washington University in St. Louis has varied programs and events for students.
Carl M. Bender is an American applied mathematician and mathematical physicist. He currently holds the Wilfred R. and Ann Lee Konneker Distinguished Professorship of Physics at Washington University in St. Louis. He also has joint positions as professor of physics at the University of Heidelberg and as visiting professor of applied mathematics and mathematical physics at Imperial College, London.
The Danforth Campus is the main campus at Washington University in St. Louis. Formerly known as the Hilltop Campus, it was officially dedicated as the Danforth Campus on September 17, 2006, in honor of William H. Danforth, the 13th chancellor of the university, the Danforth family and the Danforth Foundation. Distinguished by its collegiate gothic architecture, the 169-acre (0.68 km2) campus lies at the western boundary of Forest Park, partially in the City of St. Louis. Most of the campus is in a small enclave of unincorporated St. Louis County, while all the campus area south of Forsyth Boulevard is in suburban Clayton. Immediately to the north across Forest Park Parkway is University City.
Walk In Lay Down is a biannual concert event held in the Brookings Quadrangle at Washington University in St. Louis and has been a campus tradition since its inception in 1973. WILD, produced by the WUSTL Social Programming Board, is sponsored by the Washington University Student Union and is the largest student run event at the university. WILD is free to university undergraduate students and has rooted itself in the campus culture as an exciting time of the semester for students of the university to get together and celebrate free live music, food, and friends.
The University of Colorado Denver is a public research university located in downtown Denver, Colorado. It is part of the University of Colorado system. Established in 1912 as an extension of the University of Colorado Boulder, CU Denver attained university status and became an independent institution in 1973. CU Denver is the largest research university in Colorado, and is classified among R1: Doctoral Universities - Very High Research Activity. The university's graduate programs award more master's degrees than any other institution in the state, serving roughly 5,000 students annually.
Andrew D. Martin is chancellor and professor of political science and law at Washington University in St. Louis.
James (Jim) Gegan Miller is an American physicist, engineer, and inventor whose primary interests center around biomedical physics. He is currently a professor of physics, Medicine, and Biomedical Engineering, emeritus, at Washington University in St. Louis, where he holds the Albert Gordon Hill Endowed Chair in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. He is notable for his interdisciplinary contributions to biomedical physics, echocardiography, and ultrasonics.
1 2 "Washington University in St. Louis: Nobel Prize awarded to WashU economist Philip Dybvig". India Education. 2022-10-20. Archived from the original on 2023-01-07. Retrieved 2023-01-07. Dybvig joins a prestigious list of 26 Nobel laureates affiliated with Washington University. Dybvig joined Olin's faculty in 1990. He previously taught at Princeton University and was tenured at Yale University. He has published two textbooks and more than 35 articles in leading journals.
↑ "Washington University". Northern Illinois University Libraries Digitization Projects. Archived from the original on February 10, 2009. Retrieved January 8, 2009.
↑ Amy M. Pfeiffenberger, "Democracy at Home: The Struggle to Desegregate Washington University in the Postwar Era," Gateway-Heritage (Missouri Historical Society), vol. 10, no. 3 (Winter 1989), pp. 17–24.
↑ O'Connor, Candace (2003). Beginning a Great Work: Washington University in St. Louis, 1853-2003. Washington University in St. Louis. p.207. ISBN9780972096645.
↑ "WUSTL to provide free Metro passes". The Source. Washington University in St. Louis. 2022-06-26. Archived from the original on 2022-06-26. Retrieved 2022-06-26.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
↑ Greene, Howard; Greene, Matthew (2016). The Hidden Ivies, 3rd Edition: 63 of America's Top Liberal Arts Colleges and Universities. New York: Cliff Street Books. ISBN978-0-06-095362-1.
↑ Kurzweil, Martin; LaViolet, Tania; Davidson Pisacreta, Elizabeth; Rabinowitz, Adam; Schwartz, Emily; Wyner, Josh. "Expanding Opportunity for Lower-Income Students"(PDF). American Talent Initiative. Archived(PDF) from the original on 2022-08-17. Retrieved 2022-08-25.
