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Clark University, in Worcester, Massachusetts in the United States, is a private teaching and research institution founded in 1887 by the industrialist Jonas Clark. It is the smallest research university in the nation and in 2005 was rated "hottest school for student research" by the Kaplan-Newsweek Guide. Clark was the second oldest all-graduate institution. It is one of only three New England universities, with Harvard and Yale, to be a founding member of the Association of American Universities. Clark withdrew membership from the Association of American Universities in the late 1990s, due to a shift in focus from research to undergraduate education.

History and background

Clark's first president was G. Stanley Hall, founder of the American Psychological Association, who earned the first Ph.D. in psychology in the United States at Harvard. Clark has played a prominent role in the development of psychology as a distinguished discipline in the United States. Clark was the location for Sigmund Freud's famous "Clark Lectures" in 1909, introducing psychoanalysis to this country. Franz Boas, founder of American cultural anthropology, taught briefly at Clark between 1888 and 1892 before resigning (in a dispute with Hall over academic freedom) and moving to Columbia University. Albert Abraham Michelson, the first American to receive a Nobel Prize in Physics, best known for his involvement in the Michelson-Morley experiment which measured the speed of light, served as a professor from 1889 to 1892. In the 1920s Robert Goddard, a pioneer of rocketry, considered one of the founders of space and missile technology, served as chairman of the Physics Department.

Clark has a long history of community involvement and partnering. In 1985, the university engaged in a partnership with community groups and business organizations to revitalize Clark neighborhoods. Clark’s efforts in the University Park Partnership program include refurbishing dilapidated or abandoned homes, reselling them to area residents, and subsidizing mortgages for new home buyers. In 1997, Clark opened a secondary public school, the University Park Campus School (UPCS) that is also a professional development school for Clark’s teacher education program. Because of its long hours and demanding curricula, UPCS has been lauded as a model for collaboration between a university and an urban district. Students are able to attend Clark University free of charge upon graduation, provided they meet certain residency and admissions requirements. In the May 16, 2005 issue of Newsweek, UPCS was named the 68th best high school in the nation. Clark has been named the 84th best National university according to the US News and World Report.

Recent developments

In recent years, Clark has received great media coverage for its "fifth-year free" program. Under Clark's BA/MA program with the fifth year free, undergraduates who maintain a B+ average are eligible for tuition-free enrollment into its one year graduate programs, meaning that they can get a master of arts degree for the price of a bachelor's degree. However, the program has been criticized for forcing students to complete much of their master's classes during their senior year, giving you a degree but perhaps not a master's-level education.

Clark has flourished, marketing its programs off-campus and accepting a student body largely from out of the city and often from out of the state. Its graduate programs recruit students worldwide. Clark has developed a reputation as a free-thinking institution. In recent years, Clark has been noted especially for its geography and psychology departments, with the latter having a distinctive, if increasingly unfashionable "humanistic" orientation (humanistic psychology).The School of Geography was founded by then President Wallace Attwood in 1921 and is the first institution in the United States established for graduate study in this science. It has granted more doctoral degrees than any other geography program in the country. The geography department is best known for its strength in human-environment geography and for the development of the Idrisi geographic information systems software by Prof. Ron Eastman. It was ranked #1 for undergraduate geography by Rugg's Recommendations on Colleges and has consistently been ranked in the top 10 in the nation by other publications. Its mission is ambitious: "to educate undergraduate and graduate students to be imaginative and contributing citizens of the world, and to advance the frontiers of knowledge and understanding through rigorous scholarship and creative effort." The total bill students will receive from Clark University for the 2006-2007 academic year will be $37,100, including tuition, room and board. This figure includes a 6.5 percent increase in tuition from the 2005-2006 academic year, a matter of much contention on the campus.

Notable alumni

Commencement speakers

Trivia

  • Jerry Garcia once referred to Clark University's Goddard Library as "his favorite place to trip."
  • Activist Abbie Hoffman was an occasional student and visitor to campus. He grew up in Worcester.
  • Its students are referred to as Clarkies.
  • Research at Clark led to the birth control pill.
  • The first breakthrough in understanding how brain tissue regenerates itself was at Clark.
  • The official student newspaper of Clark University is named The Scarlet.
  • Annie's/Wendy's Clark Brunch on Main Street has been the favoured eating establishment for Clarkies for decades.
  • The Clark mascot is the Cougar.
  • Jimi Hendrix performed at Clark University about the album| http://www.authentichendrix.com/pgi-Product%20Spec?622-001-038

External links

Clark University | Universities and colleges in Massachusetts | New England Association of Schools and Colleges | Worcester, Massachusetts | Registered Historic Places in Massachusetts | Educational institutions established in the 1880s | Clark University alumni

Clark University

 

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