Welcome to the Shimer College WikiEdit

This wiki is intended to serve as a central point for the collection and coordination of data, information and knowledge regarding Shimer College, the Great Books college of Chicago. If you would like to contribute, please dive in!

This is an unofficial and unauthorized project, and the pages here are probably unauthoritative, although we provide documentation when we can. For official information about Shimer, see Shimer's website. For an authoritative overview, see the featured article about Shimer on Wikipedia.

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Shimer College: An Executive Summary Edit

Shimer College is a very small, private, undergraduate liberal arts college in Chicago with a reputation as one of the best-kept secrets in American higher education. Shimer College classes are exclusively small seminars in which students discuss original source material rather than textbooks. Notable alumni include poets, authors, political theorists, experimental artists, and computing pioneers. As of spring 2011, Shimer enrolled 128 students.

The core curriculum, a sequence of courses in the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and integrated studies, makes up two thirds of the course work required for a degree. Shimer has offered an early entrance program since 1950, a Oxford study abroad program since 1963 and a weekend college program for working adults since 1981.

Founded by Frances Wood Shimer in 1853 in the frontier town of Mt. Carroll, Illinois, it was a women's school for most of its first century. It joined with the University of Chicago (U. of C.) in 1896, and became one of the first junior colleges in the country in 1907. In 1950, it became a co-educational four-year college, took the name Shimer College, and adopted the Hutchins Plan of Great Books and Socratic seminars then in practice at the U. of C. The U. of C. relationship ended in 1958. Shimer enjoyed national recognition and strong growth in the 1960s but financial problems arising in the aftermath of the Grotesque Internecine Struggle forced it to abandon its campus in 1978. The college then moved to an improvised campus in the Chicago suburb of Waukegan, remaining there until 2006, when it moved to the Illinois Institute of Technology campus in Chicago's Bronzeville neighborhood.

Shimer College is a very small, private, undergraduate liberal arts college in Chicago with a reputation as one of the best-kept secrets in American higher education. Shimer College classes are exclusively small seminars in which students discuss original source material rather than textbooks. Notable alumni include poets, authors, political theorists, experimental artists, and computing pioneers. As of spring 2011, Shimer enrolled 128 students. Applicants to the school are evaluated on their academic potential, based primarily on an essay. No minimum grades or test scores are required. The early entrance program allows students who have not yet completed high school to start college early. Shimer has the highest rate of doctoral productivity of any liberal arts college in the country. Fifty percent of students go on to graduate study; twenty percent complete doctoral degrees.

Shimer resides on the IIT main campus, designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2005. There, students maintain Shimer College traditions but also participate in IIT student life.

Shimer practices democratic self-governance to an extent that is rare among institutions of higher education. Since 1977, the college has been governed internally by faculty, staff, and students working through a structure of committees and an egalitarian deliberative body called the Assembly.

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This page is part of the Shimer College Wiki, an independent documentation project. Shimer College, the Great Books college of Chicago, is not responsible for its content.

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Key pages to createEdit

• Early entrance program
• Weekend college program
• Oxford study abroad program
• Combined BA-JD program

• Curriculum of Shimer College
  • Integrated Studies 1
  • Integrated Studies 2
  • Integrated Studies 5
  • Integrated Studies 6
  • Natural Sciences 1
  • Natural Sciences 2
  • Natural Sciences 3
  • Natural Sciences 4
  • Social Sciences 1
  • Social Sciences 2
  • Social Sciences 3
  • Social Sciences 4
  • Humanities 1
  • Humanities 2
  • Humanities 3
  • Humanities 4

• Shimer College Campus at Mount Carroll
  • Art Studio
  • Bennnett Hall
  • Campbell Library
  • Dearborn Hall
  • Dezendorf
  • Glengarry Stables
  • Golf course
  • Gymnasium (Mount Carroll)
  • Hathaway
  • Metcalf Hall
  • McKee Hall
  • Hostetter Hall
  • Howe Hall
  • Infirmary
  • Kupcinet Playhouse
  • New Men's Dorm
  • Power Plant
  • Sawyer House
  • Science Buiding
  • Shroyer Field

• Mount Carroll Seminary campus
  • Seminary Building 1
  • Seminary Building 2
  • Seminary Building 3
  • Seminary Building 4
  • Windmill

• Shimer College Campus in Waukegan
  • 438
  • Hutchins building
  • Prairie House
  • KoKo House
  • Gymnasium (Waukegan)
  • Gregory House
  • Godot House
  • X House
  • Armstrong House
  • Admissions building
  • ShimerHenge
  • Moon Walk

• Shimer College Campus in Chicago
  • 3424 S State
• Green Curtain

• Orange Horse
• Solidarity Night
• May Fete
• May Queen
• Maypole
• Founder's Day
• Shimer Days

• Assembly
• The House

• List of Shimer College faculty
• List of Shimer College administrative staff
• List of Mount Carroll Seminary students
• List of Frances Shimer Academy students
• List of Shimer College authors
• List of Shimerians who are published authors

• St. John's College
• Deep Springs College
• Marlboro College
• University of Chicago
• Illinois Institute of Technology

Latest activityEdit

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This page is part of the Shimer College Wiki, an independent documentation project. Shimer College, the Great Books college of Chicago, is not responsible for its content.

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