Rutgers University
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey is the largest institution for higher education in the
state of
New Jersey. The university's primary campus is located in the cities of
New Brunswick and
Piscataway, with two smaller campuses in
Newark and
Camden. Rutgers offers more than 100 distinct bachelor, 100 master, and 80 doctoral and professional degree programs across 29 degree-granting schools and colleges, 16 of which offer graduate programs of study.
Rutgers is the
eighth-oldest institution of higher learning established in the
United States, originally chartered as Queen's College in 1766. While originally a
Dutch Reformed Church-affiliated institution, it is now a
nonsectarian public university and makes no religious demands on its students. Along with the
College of William and Mary, Rutgers is one of two
colonial colleges which later became public universities and though invited because of its antiquity, did not join the
Ivy League athletic conference.
Rutgers was designated the State University of New Jersey by acts of the
New Jersey Legislature in 1945 and 1956. The
University of Newark merged with Rutgers in 1946, expanding the school to include the current campus in Newark. The
College of South Jersey, which became the Camden campus, merged in 1950.
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Winter at Old Queen's, the oldest building at Rutgers, built between 1808-1825. |
Profile
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey is a leading national research university and is unique as the only university in the nation that is a
colonial chartered college (1766), a
land-grant institution (1864), and a
state university (1945/1956). Rutgers is accredited by the
Commission on Higher Education of the
Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools (1921), and in 1989, became a member of the
Association of American Universities, an organization comprised of the 62 leading research universities in
North America [Association of American Universities, AAU, Retrieved on 2006-08-06 ].
Many Rutgers departments are nationally recognized for important scholarly contributions—notably English, History, Mathematics, Philosophy, and Physics. Rutgers is ranked by
U.S. News & World Report as the third best state university in the
Northeast and the 60th best school in America.
[America's Best Colleges 2006, U.S. News & World Report, accessed May 4, 2006] Rutgers continues to be on the frontlines of science and innovation, and has given birth to discoveries and inventions such as water-soluble sustained release polymers, Tetraploids, robotic hands, artificial bovine insemination, the creation of several antibiotics, and development of the ceramic tiles for the heat shield on the
Space Shuttle.
Campuses and Organization
Rutgers University has three campuses across the state of
New Jersey, with its main campus located in
New Brunswick and
Piscataway, and two smaller campuses in the cities of
Newark and
Camden. These campuses are comprised of 29 degree-granting schools and colleges, offering undergraduate, graduate and professional levels of study.
New Brunswick-Piscataway Campus
* Cook College
* Douglass College
* Livingston College
* Rutgers College
* University College
* College of Nursing
* Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
* Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy
* Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology
* Graduate School of Education
* Mason Gross School of the Arts
* Rutgers Business Schoolâ€"New Brunswick
* School of Communication, Information and Library Studies
* School of Engineering
* School of Management and Labor Relations
* School of Social Workwidth='40' Newark Campus
* Newark College of Arts and Sciences
* University Collegeâ€"Newark
* Graduate Schoolâ€"Newark
* College of Nursing
* Rutgers Business Schoolâ€"Newark
* School of Criminal Justice
* School of Lawâ€"Newark Camden Campus
* Camden College of Arts and Sciences
* University Collegeâ€"Camden (School for non-traditional students)
* Graduate Schoolâ€"Camden
* School of Businessâ€"Camden
* School of Lawâ€"Camden |
Starting in the fall of 2007, Douglass, Livingston, University, and Rutgers Colleges will be merged into an entity to be known as the Rutgers College of Arts and Sciences. Cook College will become the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences. These structural changes are due to the often conflicting and markedly different admissions and graduation requirements between residential colleges at Rutgers University. As a result, these changes, recommended by a task force report in 2005, will subject all incoming Arts and Sciences undergraduates to the same admission and graduation requirements, and impose a universal core curriculum.
Admissions
Financial Aid
Undergraduate programs
Graduate and professional programs
Faculty
Libraries and Museums
The Rutgers University library system consists of twenty-six libraries and centers located on the University's three campuses, housing a collection of over 10.5 million holdings, including 3,522,359 volumes, 4,517,726 microforms, 2,544,126 documents, and subscriptions to 42,875 periodicals and ranking among the nation's top research libraries.
[Rutgers University Libraries: Library Facts & Figures accessed 8 August 2006.] The
Archibald S. Alexander Library, in
New Brunswick, houses the Special Collections and University Archives, and several million volumes focusing on an extensive humanities and social science collection. The
Library of Science and Medicine on the Busch Campus in
Piscataway houses the University's collection in behavioral, biological, earth and pharmaceutical sciences and engineering. On the New Brunswick-Piscataway campus, In addition to Alexander Library, many individual disciplines have their own libraries, including alcohol studies, art history, Chemistry, East Asian studies, Mathematical studies, Music, and Physics. In
Newark, the
John Cotton Dana Library (which also houses the
Institute of Jazz Studies) and the
Robeson Library in
Camden, serve their respective campuses with a broad collection of volumes.
The
Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum, on the College Avenue Campus in
New Brunswick, maintains a collection of over 50,000 works of art, focusing on
Russian and
Soviet art,
French nineteenth-century art and
American nineteenth- and twentieth-century art with a concentration on early-twentieth-century and contemporary prints.
[Zimmerli Art Museum: Collections accessed 8 August 2006.]The
Geology Museum—located in Geology Hall next to the Old Queens Building—features exhibits on geology and anthropology, with an emphasis on the natural history of
New Jersey. The largest exhibits include a dinosaur trackway from
Towaco, New Jersey; a mastodon from
Salem County; and a Ptolomaic era Egyptian mummy.
[Rutgers University Geology Museum accessed 8 August 2006.]Research
Rankings
Early history and conception
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Jacob Hardenbergh and Theodorus Frelinghuysen's son John lived in this building, known as the "Old Dutch Parsonage," in Somerville, New Jersey. |
Shortly after the creation of the College of New Jersey (later
Princeton University) in 1746, ministers of the
Dutch Reformed Church sought to establish autonomy in ecclesiastical affairs. At that time, those who wanted to become ministers within the church had to travel to the
Netherlands to be trained and
ordained, and many of the affairs of churches in the
American colonies were managed from
Europe. Thus, the ministers sought to create a governing body known as a classis to give local autonomy to the church in the colonies, and offer opportunities for the
education of ministers.
Throughout the 1750s, Dutch ministers joined the effort to create a classis in the colonies, including
Theodorus Jacobus Frelinghuysen who travelled on horseback in winter of 1755 to several congregations throughout the northeast to rally ministers and congregations to the cause. Soon after, Frelinghuysen travelled to
the Netherlands to appeal to the General Synod, the
Dutch Reformed Church's governing council, for the creation of the classis. In 1761, the effort having failed, Frelinghuysen set sail for the colonies, but as his vessel approached
New York City he mysteriously perished at sea.
After Frelinghuysen's death,
Jacob Rutsen Hardenbergh (later Rutgers' first president) established himself as spokesperson for the cause, and a strong supporter of establishing a
college in
New Jersey. Hardenbergh travelled to
Europe, renewing Frelinghuysen's efforts to gain the Synod's approval, but was also rejected. Much to the Synod's chagrin, however, Hardenburgh returned to the
colonies with money for the establishment of a college.
Queen's College
The school now called Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, was chartered on
November 10,
1766 as "the trustees of Queen's College, in New-Jersey" in honor of
King George III's Queen-consort,
Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (1744–1818). The charter was signed and the young college supported by
William Franklin (1730–1813), the last Royal Governor of
New Jersey and illegitimate son of
Benjamin Franklin. The original charter specified the establishment both of the college, and of an institution called the Queen's College Grammar School, intended to be a
preparatory school affiliated and governed by the college. This institution, today the
Rutgers Preparatory School, was a part of the college community until 1957.
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Early nineteenth century drawing of Old Queen's |
The original purpose of Queen's College was to
"educate the youth in language, liberal, the divinity, and useful arts and sciences" and for the training of future ministers for the
Dutch Reformed Church—though the university is now non-sectarian and makes no religious demands on its students. It admitted its first students in 1771—a single sophomore and a handful of first-year students taught by a lone instructor—and granted its first degree in 1774, to
Matthew Leydt. Despite the religious nature of the college, it first held classes at a tavern called the
Sign of the Red Lion, located on the corner of Albany and Neilson streets on what is today the grounds of the
Johnson & Johnson corporate headquarters in New Brunswick
[Rutgers College and the American Revolution, accessed July 12, 2006]. When the Revolutionary War broke out and taverns were suspected by the British as being hotbeds of rebel activity, the college abandoned the tavern and held classes in private houses, in and near New Brunswick.
In its early years, Queen's College was plagued by a lack of funds. In 1793, with the fledgling college falling on hard times, the board of trustees voted on a resoluton to merge with the College of New Jersey (now
Princeton University). The measure failed by one vote. The problem did not go away, and in 1795, lacking both funds and tutors, the trustees consider moving the college to New York. Instead, they decide to close, only to reopen in 1808 after the Trustees raised $12,000.
The next year, the College got a building of its own, affectionately called "Old Queen's" (still standing), designed by the noted architect,
John McComb (who also designed City Hall in Manhattan) which is regarded today by architectural experts as one of the nation's finest examples of
Federal architecture.
[Paths to Historic Rutgers: A Self-Guided Tour accessed 9 August 2006.] The college's third president, Rev.
Ira Condict, laid the cornerstone on
April 27,
1809. However, financial woes delayed completion of the building for 14 years.
The
New Brunswick Theological Seminary, founded in
1784, relocated from
Brooklyn, New York to New Brunswick in
1810, and shared facilities with Queen's College (and the
Queen's College Grammar School as both were then under the oversight of the
Reformed Church in America. During those formative years, all three institutions were fit in the Old Queen's Building, (then the only structure on campus). During its early years, the college developed as a classic liberal arts institutions, and this development (coupled with both institutions growing larger and resulting in overcrowding at the site), caused Rutgers College and the New Brunswick Theological Seminary to sever this arrangement, and the Seminary relocated to a 7-acre (28,000 m²) tract of land less than one half mile (800m) away in 1856. Both institutions maintain a close-knit relationship to this day, and the Seminary's Gardner Sage Library participates in the Rutgers University Library system.
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Col. Henry Rutgers (1745â€"1830) |
Under the Rutgers Name
A nationwide economic depression, combined with impending
war, forced Queen's College to close down a second time, in 1812. In 1825, Queen's College was reopened, and its name was changed to "Rutgers College" in honor of
American Revolutionary War hero Colonel
Henry Rutgers (1745–1830). According to the Board of Trustees, Colonel Rutgers was honored because he epitomized Christian values, although it should be noted the Colonel was a wealthy bachelor known for his philanthropy. A year after the school renamed itself, it received 2 donations from its namesake. Rutgers, a descendant of an old Dutch family that had settled in
New Amsterdam (now
New York City), gave the fledgling college a $200 bell that hangs from the cupola of the Old Queen's building; then later in 1826 he donated the interest on a $5,000 bond. This second donation finally gave the college the sound financial footing it had sorely needed. The college's early troubles inspired numerous student songs, including an adaptation of the drinking song
Down Among the Dead Men, with the lyrics "Here's a toast to old Rutgers, loyal men/May she ne'er go down but to rise again."
Rutgers College became the land-grant college of New Jersey in 1864 under the
Morrill Act of 1862, resulting in the establishment of the Rutgers Scientific School, featuring departments of
agriculture,
engineering, and
chemistry. Further expansion in the sciences came with the founding of the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station in 1880 and the division of the Rutgers Scientific School into the College of Engineering (now the School of Engineering) in 1914 and the College of Agriculture (now
Cook College) in 1921. The precursors to several other Rutgers divisions were also established during this period: the College of Pharmacy (now the Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy) in
1892, the New Jersey College for Women (now
Douglass College) in
1918, and the School of Education in
1924. Later, University College, founded to serve part-time, commuting students and Livingston College, emphasizing the urban experience, were created.
The first Summer Session began in 1913 with one six-week session. That summer program offered 47 courses and had an enrollment of 314 students. Currently, Summer Session offers over 1,000 courses to more than 15,000 students on the
Camden,
Newark, and
New Brunswick/
Piscataway campuses, off-campus, and abroad.
Rutgers College was renamed Rutgers University in 1924.
New Jersey's flagship university
Rutgers was designated the State University of New Jersey by acts of the
New Jersey Legislature in 1945 and 1956.
[N.J.S.A. 18A:65-1 et seq. (Public Law 1956, chapter 61) repealing and succeeding P.L. 1945, c.49, p.115. accessed 8 August 2006.] Before the 1956 law went into effect, the Board of Trustees voted to divest itself of the
Rutgers Preparatory School, which became fully independent in
1957 and relocated to a campus on on the Wells Estate (purchased from the
Colgate-Palmolive Company) in nearby
Somerset, New Jersey. Under the 1956 law, Rutgers was to be governed both by its
Board of Trustees, maintaining the assets of the college and its continuity from the 1766 charter, as well as a
Board of Governors consisting of eleven members: five members selected by the Board of Trustees, and six appointed by the
Governor of New Jersey.
Since the 1950s, Rutgers has continued to expand, especially in the area of graduate education. The Graduate School-New Brunswick, and professional schools have been established in such areas as
business,
management,
public policy,
social work, applied and professional
psychology, the
fine arts, and
communication,
information and
library studies.
[Graduate Schools, Rutgers University, Retrieved on 6 August 2006]]] (A number of these schools offer undergraduate programs as well.)
In both
1947 and
1966, the College Avenue Gymnasium—built on the site of the first intercollegiate football game—hosted New Jersey's Constitutional Conventions.
A nationwide trend, caused mostly out of the civil rights and women's rights movements, caused many male-only colleges to alter their admissions policies to accept women and thus become
coeducational. Rutgers, along with many of the older American institutions (including
Princeton and
Yale) became co-educational in the 1960s and 1970s. On
September 10,
1970, after several years of debate and planning, the Board of Governors voted to admit women into the previously all-male
Rutgers College. Today, Douglass College (originally the New Jersey College for Women) remains all-female, while the rest of the University is
coeducational.
Atmosphere
Housing
Student organizations
Greek life
In History
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Scene from Rutgers football game on September 11, 2004 vs. the University of New Hampshire |
Rutgers was among the first American institutions to engage in intercollegiate athletics, and participated in a small circle of schools that included
Yale University,
Columbia University and long-time rival,
Princeton University.
On
May 2,
1866, in the first intercollegiate athletic event at Rutgers, the college's
baseball team was defeated 40-2 by a team from the College of New Jersey (now
Princeton University).
Rutgers University is often referred to as
The Birthplace of College Football. Rutgers and Princeton played the first intercollegiate football match on
November 6,
1869, on a plot of ground where the present-day Rutgers gymnasium now stands. Rutgers won the game, with a score of 6 runs to Princeton's 4.
However, "football" at the time was a name given to variety of games, and the rules of the game played by Rutgers in 1869 resembled
soccer much more than modern American football. Scores were computed in runs (roughly equivalent to goals). Instead of wearing uniforms, the players stripped off their hats, coats, and vests and bound their suspenders around the waistbands of their trousers. For headgear, the Rutgers team wound their scarlet scarves into turbans atop their heads. During the 1870s, games resembling
rugby became popular at other American colleges, and Rutgers eventually adopted similar rules. These games ultimately developed into modern American football. (See the article
History of American football, for further information.) Rutgers, which declined an invitation to join the
Ivy League in the 1950s, maintains athletic rivalries with
Princeton and
Columbia in all intercollegiate sports but has not met either school in football since 1980.
The first intercollegiate competition in
Ultimate Frisbee (now called simply "Ultimate") was held between students from Rutgers and
Princeton on
November 6,
1972—the one hundred third anniversary of the first intercollegiate football game. Rutgers won 29-27
[.].
Today
Today, Rutgers is a member of the
Big East Conference, (in football since 1991, all other sports since 1995) a collegiate athletic conference consisting of 16 colleges and universities from the East Coast and
Midwestern regions of the United States. The Big East is a member of the
Bowl Championship Series. Rutgers currently fields 27 intercollegiate sports programs and is a
Division I-A school as sanctioned by the
National Collegiate Athletic Association. Since joining the Big East, the Scarlet Knights have won two conference tournament titles: men's
soccer (1997) and
baseball (2000). Several other teams have won regular season titles but failed to win the conference's championship tournament.
In 2005, Rutgers accepted a bowl bid to play
Arizona State University in the
Insight Bowl in
Phoenix, Arizona. The Scarlet Knights lost to the ASU with a score of 45 to 40. The only other bowl appearance for the Scarlet Knights was in 1978 at the the now defunct
Garden State Bowl, held at
Giants Stadium, also against the Sun Devils of Arizona State.
Venues
Controversy and debate
The Cannon War
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A few intrepid Rutgers students painting the cannon on the Princeton University campus |
Howard Fullerton, a member of the
Order of the Bull's Blood, goes down in Rutgers history not only for penning the
alma mater, but also for allegedly inspiring the theft of a cannon from the campus of
Princeton University on
April 25,
1875, an event—and the ensuing debate between the two university presidents—reported sensationally in nationwide newspapers. The cannon was believed to have belonged to Rutgers when used in battle during the American Revolution. Under the cover of night, a dozen Rutgers students, stole the cannon from its place at Princeton, and brought it back by wagon to
New Brunswick before the following dawn. In retaliation, Princeton students raided the Rutgers Armory and stole a few muskets. Reputedly—though this may have been baseless rhetoric originating from the heated debate after the theft—the Rutgers students are accused of having stolen the wrong cannon. Eventually the committee appointed by the two colleges recommended the return of the stolen items to their owners. When the cannon was returned, Princeton University officials ordered it buried in the ground, encased in cement, with only a few feet of the butt end exposed above ground.
Several Rutgers students attempted to repeat the crime, unsuccessfully, in October 1946, attaching one end of a length of heavy chain to the cannon and the other to their
Ford. Surprised by Princeton men and the local constabulatory, they gunned the engine of the Ford so viciously that the car was torn in half. The Rutgers army managed to escape, but with neither the car, nor their prize, the cannon.
To this day, intrepid Rutgers students journey the 16 miles to
Princeton University to place their declaration of ownership of the cannon by painting the cannon scarlet red. Unfortunately, like the students who stole the cannon in 1875, they usually paint the wrong cannon, as there are two on
Cannon Green behind
Nassau Hall at
Princeton. Today, a cannon is placed in the ground before Old Queens at Rutgers, by the class of 1877, memorializing both this event and several alumni in the armed services who were killed in action.
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Statue of Prince William the Silent on the Voorhees Mall |
Around Campus
Fenton B. Turck, a New York physician and biologist, with the assistance of railroad magnate, and longtime Rutgers trustee
Leonor F. Loree (RC 1877), anonymously donated a statute of
Prince William the Silent (1533-1584) of the
House of Nassau and later
Prince of Orange, who was the leader of the
Dutch rebellion against the Spanish that set off the
Eighty Years' War and resulted in the formal independence of the
United Provinces in
1648. Turck, of Dutch extraction, intended to give the statue to the University to signify the institution's Dutch roots. He kept the statute in the basement of his laboratory in Manhattan for eight years before it was unveiled on the present Voorhees Mall on
9 June 1928.
[Paths to Historic Rutgers: A Self-Guided Tour accessed 9 August 2006.] Allegedly, the statute is said to whistle when a
virgin passes by. So far, Prince William has remained silent.
This statute is a rough replica of a
similar monument that stands in
The Hague.
Commencement
At Commencement exercises in the Spring, tradition leads undergraduates to break clay pipes over the Cannon monument in front of Old Queens, symbolizing the breaking of ties with the college, and leaving behind the good times of one's undergraduate years. This symbolic gesture dates back to when pipe-smoking was fashionable among undergraduates, and many college memories were of evenings of pipe smoking and revelry with friends.
Alma Mater
The
alma mater of Rutgers University is the song entitled
On the Banks of the Old Raritan, written by Howard Fullerton (Class of 1872). The lyrics to the song are as follows:
I.: My father sent me to old Rutgers,: And resolv'd that I should be a man;: And so I settled down,: in that noisy college town,: On the banks of the old Raritan.
(
Chorus): On the banks of the old Raritan, my boys,: where old Rutgers ever more shall stand,: For has she not stood since the time of the flood,: On the banks of the old Raritan.
II.: Then sing aloud to Alma Mater,: And keep the scarlet in the van;: For with her motto high,: Rutgers' name shall never die,: On the banks of the old Raritan.: (
Chorus)
*
N.B.:
The phrase "my boys" in the first line of the chorus was changed in 1990 to "my friends" in light of Rutgers being coeducational since 1970.*
Rutgers Gardens*
Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum*
Colonial colleges*
List of notable Rutgers University people*
Lists of colleges and universities*
Philoclean Society*
Public Ivy*
Rutgers-Newark*
Rutgers-Camden*
Rutgers University Glee ClubNotes and Citations
Background Resources
*
www.rutgers.edu (Rutgers University website)
* Demarest, William Henry Steele.
History of Rutgers College: 1776-1924. (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers College, 1924).
*
History of Rutgers College: or an account of the union of Rutgers College, and the Theological Seminary of the General Synod of the Reformed Dutch Church. Prepared and published at the request of several trustees of the College, by a trustee. (New York: Anderson & Smith, 1833).
* McCormick, Richard P.
Rutgers: a Bicentennial History. (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1966).
* Schmidt, George P.
Princeton and Rutgers: The Two Colonial Colleges of New Jersey. (Princeton, NJ: Van Nostrand, 1964).
External links
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www.rutgers.edu — Rutgers University website
*
Rutgers Admissions*
Rutgers Alumni Association — Established 1831, fourth oldest alumni group in the nation.
*
"Rutgers Through the Years" Timeline — more on Rutgers history
*
WRSU — Rutgers University radio station
*
www.scarletknights.com — Rutgers Athletics website
*
scarletnation.com — Scarlet Nation Fan Site
*
The Daily Targum — the daily newspaper at Rutgers University, since 1869.
*
The Centurion — the monthly conservative magazine published at Rutgers.
*
The Medium — Rutgers controversial entertainment weekly newspaper.
