西北大学（Northwestern University）是美国一间著名的私立研究型大学，这所私人学府的主校园位于伊利诺伊州的埃文斯顿市，临近芝加哥，面积240公顷，就在密歇根湖畔。在芝加哥市中心也有校园。
西北大学于1851年创立，一开始是为西北领地的人服务，当时在密歇根湖畔的379公顷农地被划给大学作为校园使用。2007年大学组织为11个学校和学院，有8284名本科生和9744名硕士生和博士生，授予了2089个学士学位和3543个硕士和博士学位。2007年学校有2925名全时教员和2.84亿美元研究经费。
西北大学是全国大学体育协会十大联盟高校的创会成员，并一直是唯一的私立大学成员。
历史
西北大学埃文斯顿校园的大门
西北大学是1851年芝加哥的卫理宗人士建立的。1855年它正式运行时有两个教员和十名学生。学校的九名创立者都是卫理宗的人，在第一次组织会议前跪下祈祷。大学名称来源于其创办者希望为前西北领地上建立的州的人民服务的愿望。这些州为俄亥俄州、印第安纳州、伊利诺伊州、密歇根州、威斯康辛州和明尼苏达州的部分地区。1855年埃文斯顿校园只有一座临时性的建筑。第一座正式的和持久性的建筑是1869年建造的大学大厦（University Hall）。在1920年代里西北大学在芝加哥为法学、医学和商业硕士学校建造了芝加哥校园。
西北大学校徽上的座右铭是Quaecumque sunt vera，这是拉丁文，源于《新约•腓立比书》，意为“凡是真实的”。另外校徽上一本翻开的书上还有一句希腊语：ho logos pleres charitos kai aletheias，意思是“充满荣光和真理的道”。它来自《约翰福音》：“道成了肉身住在我们中间，充充满满的有恩典有真理。我们也见过他的荣光，正是父独生子的荣光”。这两句格言反映出了西北大学创立者的价值观，体现出了其卫理宗的遗产。
西北大学的创办证书保障大学永远不必交财产税，因此西北大学与埃文斯顿市政府之间的关系往往困难。由于建筑、司法和政策等问题经常发生紧张。近年来埃文斯顿政府内的组织试图把西北大学的校园分成几个不相连的部分来削弱学生的投票力量。
1873年埃文斯顿女子学院与西北大学合并，后来著名的提倡妇女拥有选举权的弗朗西斯•威拉德成为学院的首位院长。早在1869年西北大学就已经招收女生了，1874年第一名女学生毕业。
1892年紫色成为西北大学的正式校色，取代了此前的黑色和金色。一个学校委员会觉得这两个颜色被太多其它学校使用了。今天西北大学只有一个官方颜色，即皇家紫色。但是传统地设立了白色是一个非官方的单是实际上也是一个校色。因此在西北大学的校歌里除紫色外也提到白色（“欢呼紫色，欢呼白色”）在大学的指引中也把白色列出了。
1930年代里西北大学几乎与其学术竞争者芝加哥大学合并。1933年当时两座大学的校长均认为为了保证两座大学的未来最好它们合并，西北大学的埃文斯顿校园作为本科校园使用，西北大学的芝加哥校园作专业校园，芝加哥大学的校园则做研究生校园。但是西北大学的理事会否决了这个建议。
1939年西北大学主办了全国大学体育协会第一次篮球冠军赛。1948年著名人类学家梅尔维尔•赫斯科维茨在西北大学设立了非洲研究项目，这是美国大学中第一个这样的学术机构。1978年5月西北大学发生了第一起邮包炸弹事件。一年后第二起事件也发生在西北大学。
1999年西北大学的学生记者在安东尼•波特被处死两天前发现了证明他不是罪犯的证明。自此以来他们又为九个人平反。2003年1月11日伊利诺伊州州长乔治•瑞安在西北大学法学院发表讲话时公布他将减轻150多名死囚犯的判决。他说此举“适合今天在西北大学聚集的学生、教师、律师和调查者们，他们揭露了伊利诺伊州死刑系统可悲的状况。”
校园
埃文斯顿
西北大学的埃文斯顿校园包括本科生、研究生和商业学校，沿密歇根湖南北走向。校园北部是学生会建筑、亨利•克劳恩体育馆和其它体育设施、技术研究所、天文台和其它与科学有关的建筑物，包括福特汽车公司设计中心。南部则是人文科学建筑、音乐建筑、艺术建筑和女学生会建筑。这个区分，加上南部离埃文斯顿市中心比较近，使得校园的南北有两种不同的文化。1960年代里大学通过向密歇根湖填湖扩大了校园。这新增的84公顷上今天有图书馆、音乐厅等设施。
芝加哥公共交通设施通过埃文斯顿的高架列车被称为紫线，使用西北大学校色，其中有两个站离校园南端很近，一个离北端很近。中央站离大学的橄榄球场非常近。西北大学在芝加哥市内的学校和医院离红线的芝加哥站很近。除这些铁路设施外两个校园还有多个汽车线路服务。除此之外在校园和橄榄球场附近还分别有一个火车站。
医学院的沃德大厦是美国首座学术摩天大楼
西北大学的芝加哥校园有医学院、医院、法学院、兼职商学院和向职业人员提供晚校和周末班的深造学校。它的沃德大厦是美国首座学术摩天大楼。
卡塔尔
2008年秋西北大学在多哈教育城与美国其它五座大学卡内基梅隆大学、康奈尔大学、乔治城大学、德州农工大学和弗吉尼亚联邦大学一起设立了一座校园。一座新闻学校和一座通讯学校提供相应的学士学位。卡塔尔教育、科学和社群发展基金会为建筑和管理用费以及50至60名教职员工的薪水提供金费，部分教职员工将在三个校园中巡回。
组织和管理
西北大学由一个私人指定的理事会拥有和管理。目前的理事会有70名成员，其主席是帕特•瑞安，把它的管理权授予一名选出的校长作为大学的最高执行官。在其历史上西北大学共有过15名校长。现校长为亨利•彼安，从1995年1月开始任职，他已经宣布将于2009年8月31日辞职，莫顿.夏皮罗(Morton O. Schapiro)将从2009年9月1日出任校长。目前校长手下有21名副校长、主任何其他管理、经济、系和学生事物的助手。现任教务长Daniel I. Linzer是2007年9月上任的，他是校长手下的大学首席学术官员。各学院院长、跨学术单位领导人和17个系的委员会全部向他负责和报告。
大学的参议会由所有全职教授组成，就教育政策做建议，提议名誉学位候选人，此外还可以设立特殊委员会，如由22名成员组成的全系委员会作为系与管理组织之间的联系。助理学生政府和研究生协会也是类似选举出来的，他们代表本科生和研究生与大学管理机构联系。
西北大学由11个学校和学院组成。每个学校的系由大学校长、教务长、学院院长和教务系组成。系的任务在于教学、研究、对学生提供顾问以及参加委员会工作。每个学校系的有投票权成员（助理教授以上）决定管理需要、学位需要、课程、纪律和学位推荐。
2007年西北大学的捐赠提高11.4%，达72.43亿美元，使它成为美国捐赠第八高的大学。从1997年至2007年捐赠平均增长率为13.4%。此外从2006年至2007年大学还获得了1.879亿美元的礼物和其它支援支持。2007年大学把它的止痛片普瑞巴林专利（由西北大学教授理查德•布鲁斯•西尔维曼发明）以七亿美元的高价出售，这是历史上售价最高的专利。大学获得的捐赠被用来提供经济资助、研究和建筑。
学术
西北大学是一个大规模的研究大学，其学生大多数寄宿。中北部院校协会和相应的美国化学、心理学、商业、教育、新闻业、音乐、工程、法学和医学专业组织认可其130多个本科项目以及70个研究生和专业项目。在2006年至2007年学期中西北大学授予了2089个学士学位、2665个硕士学位、462个博士学位和416个专业学位。
本科项目四年，有大学大多数学生，强调“艺术和科学/专业”。每个学校的系自己设立学位要求。每学年分三学期，每学期约十周，三个学期从每年的九月末开始，六月初结束。一般本科生需要在毕业前至少学习了12个学期，但是西北大学的学生业可以通过加速、荣誉和混合医学、科学、数学、工程和新闻学科。博士研究生项目与本科项目一起进行。
本科毕业生班中按照成绩平均积点最高的3%被授予最优等，其次的5%被授予极优等，在其次的8%被授予优等。西北大学也有荣誉学术协会。至今为止西北大学向不同人物授予了520个名誉学位。
学生
在2006至2007年学术年西北大学招收了8284名本科生、8249名研究生和1495名专业学生。本科生中51.6%是女生，他们来自美国50个州和其它50个国家。收录被定义为“比较选择，较少转入”。2011届（2007年入学）的本科生有21,930名学生报名：5872名被接受（26.8%）、1981名征收（33.7%）还有96.3%的降级学生。86%的学生在四年后毕业，六年后93%的学生毕业。
学生人口统计
本科生 研究生 美国人口统计
非裔美国人 6.0% 4.0% 12.1%
亚裔美国人 16.6% 9.9% 4.3%
白人 59.2% 46.0% 65.8%
西班牙裔美国人 6.7% 3.1% 14.5%
美洲土著人 0.1% 0.2% 0.9%
国际学生 5.0% 20.0% 无
2008至2009学年的本科生学费为37,125美元。西北大学仅在需求基础上提供贷款、勤工助学、奖学金。在2007至2008学年中学校向本科和研究生共提供2.138亿美元资助，其中包括向3380名本科生提供的大学基金以及联邦、州资助和其它来源的资助，共8100万美元。从2008年秋开始西北大学把对最需要资助的学生的贷款改为奖学金。46%的西北大学毕业生毕业时负血债，其平均额为18,393美元。
在六个本科学校中艺术和科学占新生的51.2%、工程占17.2%、通讯占14.7%、新闻占8.4%、音乐占5.0%、教育占8.4%。毕业生最多的五个学位为经济、新闻、通讯、心理学和政治学。专业学生一般与他们的学校联在一起，而追求更高学位的研究生则主要通过研究生学校收录和管理。在科学、工程和健康方面收录的2075名学生中化学、结合生物、材料科学、电子工程和计算机科学、神经科学和经济的成分最高。在专业学生中管理、法学和医学是招收最高的。
图书馆和博物馆
西北大学图书馆系统由四座埃文斯顿校园上的图书馆和三座芝加哥校园上的图书馆组成，中心图书馆位于埃文斯顿，此外还有两座与两个神学院相关的图书馆。图书馆藏4600万册书、4500万微胶卷和4.5万分杂志，是美国第30大的大学生图书馆和第十大的私人大学图书馆。2006年图书馆费用共为2630万美元，增添了10万册书。图书馆中包括世界上最大的非洲研究收藏、大量早期印刷音乐和手稿以及后现代化作品收藏、19和20世纪西方艺术收藏和建筑学杂志。图书馆系统与12个其它大学一起参加Google图书搜索数字化其收藏。大学的艺术博物馆是芝加哥地区的大艺术博物馆之一，其永久性收藏包括4000多部艺术品。它三分之一的展览地面用来进行临时和巡回展出。
系和研究
1917年西北大学被选入美国大学协会并保持“非常高”的研究活动。2006年西北大学的研究和发展金费共达4.2亿美元，在美国所有大学中列第34名，在私立大学中列第13名。其中2.5亿来自联邦政府、1220万来自工业界、510万来自州和地方政府、4450万来自其它来源、1.082亿来自西北大学自己的基金，这是美国私立大学中第三高的。西北大学研究和工程研究占地7.79万平方米，其中主要永在医学和生物科学中。2006年西北大学支付2980万美元用于非科学和技术领域的研究如管理、教育、司法、通讯和新闻业，这是所有美国大学中第12高的。2008年西北大学的研究导致了184项发明、158个专利申请、获得了32个专利、促使了九个公司的成立，通过提供允许赢得了7.76亿美元的收入，其中把普瑞巴林的专利出售给辉瑞赢得了七亿美元，这是历史上专利售价最高的纪录。
大学的11个学校有2925名全职教务人员约5600名职员，其中26名美国国家科学院院士、74名美国文理科学院院士、21名美国国家工程院院士、六名医学研究所成员。知名教务人员包括前气象人党首领柏娜汀•杜宏、民族学者加里•阿兰•费因、京都奖获得者哲学家尤尔根•哈贝马斯、邓普顿奖获得者查尔斯•泰勒、普利策奖获得者历史学家盖瑞•威尔斯、亚历山大•黑蒙、玛丽•札莫曼等。前教务人员有艺术家爱德•佩施克、作家查尔斯•纽曼、诺贝尔奖获得者化学家约翰•波普、军事社会学家查尔斯•莫斯科斯等。
西北大学有多座研究中心
校园生活
传统
西北大学的学生传统包括：
• 画石头（原来一座1902届学生捐赠的喷泉）是希腊组织、学生团体和校内活动的广告栏。
• 西北大学在橄榄球比赛时有数个传统习俗。在对方控制球的时候学生把手做成爪的形状并像野猫叫。在发球时他们摇钥匙来表示即使西北输了将来其它学校的毕业生依然要为学生停车。
• 瑞贝卡•克劳恩钟楼在西北大学赢得一场球赛后会打紫光灯。
• 西北大学的跳舞马拉松是一个30小时的募捐福利活动，每年冬季举办。
• 美国学习最后一周前的周日上午九点种时学生探出窗户或者在校园里使足力气叫喊。
• 每年春天亡兵纪念日后的周末在填湖的校园地带进行音乐会[。
媒体
《西北日报》是西北大学最主要的学生报纸。在学期内它于工作日出版。西北大学的电台功率7200瓦，向芝加哥及其北部市郊播送。西北新闻网路是一个学生电视台。“西北之北”是一个学生组织的网上杂志。
艺术
校园里戏剧演出非常受欢迎，每年有两部剧上演。西北大学业有不同的即兴表演团体。校园上有十个乐队和不同的舞蹈队。
服务
许多西北大学学生积极参加社群服务。比如每年举办的舞蹈马拉松是一场为时30小时的活动，2007年募捐70.8万美元。另一个每年举办的活动是万圣节下午向800多名当地儿童举办的游戏和分发糖果。
居住
西北大学有多个学生宿舍，其中包括一般的宿舍和专题宿舍。一些宿舍是专门给某个系的学生住的，比如艺术、科学和工程、通讯等等。
2007年秋27%的学生参加学生会。
体育
2005年全国大学体育协会女子袋棍球比赛，弗吉尼亚骑兵对西北野猫
西北大学是十大联盟成员之一，也是该联盟唯一的私立学校。目前西北大学有19个跨学院体育队（八个男子队和11个女子队）以及众多体育俱乐部。
西北大学的体育队伍起名为野猫队。1924年前他们被称为“紫队”，非正式也被称为“战斗卫理宗队”。1924年《芝加哥论坛报》的一名记者写道，即使他们输给了芝加哥大学，“埃文斯顿的橄榄球队没有丧气；野猫这个名字更适合他们。”这个名称非常受欢迎因此大学理事会成员数月后把“野猫队”正式当作球队的名称。1972年学生投票把名称从“野猫队”改为“紫雾队”，但是这个名称不受欢迎。
西北大学运动员的吉祥物是野猫威利，不过一开始野猫不是他们的吉祥物。最早是林肯动物园里的一头熊。1923年秋这头熊在比赛前都要上场。但是一次失败的赛季后球队认为它是恶运的带来者，因此不再用它。1933年威利首次作为标志出现，但是一直到1947年才成为吉祥物。球队在埃文斯顿比赛时西北大学进行曲乐队总是进行表演，以及在赛后演奏校歌。
橄榄球场可容纳4.9万名观众
西北大学橄榄球队成绩不佳，其最高分为449-596-44，它一共七次被邀请参加杯赛，只有1949年进入决赛。它是等级赛中输得最多的球队。它也是连输比赛纪录的创立者：从1979年至1982年它连输了34场球。近年来它的成绩可嘉，1996年、1997年、2000年、2003年、2005年和2008年均参加了杯赛。2004年它以33：27战胜了俄亥俄州立大学队，打破了一个33年的失败系列。
2006年其教练突然逝世后一名31岁的前全美橄榄球队成员和西北大学毕业生成为教练，成为历史上最年轻的大学队教练。
2006年在Facebook上发现了西北大学女子足球队收录新队员仪式的照片，为该球队带来和坏名声。
最近成绩比较好的项目有男子足球、摔跤、男子游泳、男子高尔夫球、女子网球、垒球、击剑和女子袋棍球。女子袋棍球连续赢得了四次冠军，2005年没有输一场球。1931年男子篮球队获得国家冠军。
毕业生
约翰•保罗•史蒂文斯, 美国最高法院大法官, J.D. '47
拉姆•伊曼纽尔, 美国现任白宫幕僚长
西北大学毕业生中包括史特拉奖(Stella Awards)得主、皮尔森裤子索偿案原诉人Roy L. Pearson Jr.、参议员和总统候选人乔治•麦加文、诺贝尔经济奖获得者乔治•斯蒂格勒、诺贝尔文学奖获得者索尔•贝娄、美国最高法庭助理法官约翰•保罗•史蒂文斯、前最高法庭法官和美国驻联合国代表阿瑟•戈德堡、政治家阿德莱•史蒂文森。许多西北大学毕业生在芝加哥和伊利诺伊州起非常重要的作用，比如前伊利诺伊州州长罗德•布拉戈耶维奇、芝加哥公牛和芝加哥白袜的主席杰里•莱恩斯多夫和剧院指导玛丽•札莫曼。西北大学毕业生大卫•斯科尔顿和葛拉罕•史潘尼尔目前分别任康奈尔大学和宾夕法尼亚州立大学校长。拉姆•伊曼纽尔,美国政治家和现任白宫幕僚长于1985年在西北大学获得演说和通讯硕士学位。
从西北大学毕业的著名的电影电视演员和导演有安-玛格丽特、沃伦•比蒂、大卫•史威默、安妮•杜德克、扎克•布拉夫、玛格•海根柏格、朱莉娅•路易斯-德利法斯、杰里•斯普林格、梅根•莫拉莉、查尔顿•赫斯顿、威廉•丹尼尔斯、理查德•本杰明和史蒂芬•科拜尔。海瑟•海德利、沃特•科尔等在百老汇剧院成名。在纽约、洛杉矶和芝加哥西北大学毕业生在剧院、电影和电视中人数之多以至于被人称为“西北大学黑手党”。
西北大学的记者学校毕业了众多知名记者和政治活动家，其中包括三十八名普利策奖获得者如伊丽莎白•巴米勒、文森特•拉弗雷、柯琳•欧丹妮尔、瑞切尔•尼科尔斯、迈克尔•威尔伯恩等。
English
Northwestern University is a private research university with campuses in Evanston and Chicago in Illinois, United States. Northwestern has 12 undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees.
Northwestern was founded in 1851 by John Evans, for whom Evanston is named, and eight other lawyers, businessmen and Methodist leaders to serve the people of a region that had once been known as the Northwest Territory. Instruction began in 1855; women were admitted in 1869. Today, the main campus is a 240-acre (97 ha) parcel in Evanston, along the shores of Lake Michigan. The university's law and medical schools are located on a 25-acre (10 ha) campus in Chicago's Streeterville neighborhood. In 2008, the University opened a campus in Education City, Doha, Qatar with programs in journalism and communication. In academic year 2010-11, Northwestern enrolled 8,397 undergraduate and 7,870 graduate and professional students.
Northwestern has one of the largest university endowments in the United States, currently valued at $7.2 billion. One of only 62 institutions elected to the Association of American Universities (1917), Northwestern was awarded more than $500 million in research grants in 2010–2011, placing it in the first tier of the major research universities in the United States by the Center for Measuring University Performance. Its schools of management, engineering, and communication, for example, are among the most academically productive in the nation.Northwestern is a founding member of the Big Ten Conference and remains the only private university in the conference. The Northwestern Wildcats compete in 19 intercollegiate sports in the NCAA's Division I.
History
Main article: History of Northwestern University
The foundation of Northwestern University is traceable to a meeting on May 31, 1850 of nine prominent Chicago businessmen, Methodist leaders and attorneys who had formed the idea of establishing a university to serve what had once been known as the Northwest Territory. On January 28, 1851, the Illinois General Assembly granted a charter to the Trustees of the North-Western University, making it the first chartered university in Illinois. The school’s nine founders, all of whom were Methodists (three of them ministers), knelt in prayer and worship before launching their first organizational meeting. Although they affiliated the university with the Methodist Episcopal Church, they were committed to non-sectarian admissions, believing that Northwestern should serve all people in the newly developing territory.
John Evans, for whom Evanston is named, bought 379 acres (153 ha) of land along Lake Michigan in 1853, and Philo Judson developed plans for what would become the city of Evanston. The first building, Old College, opened on November 5, 1855. To raise funds for construction, Northwestern sold $100 "perpetual scholarships" entitling the purchaser and his heirs to free tuition. In 1873 the Evanston College for Ladies merged with Northwestern, and Frances Willard, who later gained fame as a suffragette and as one of the founders of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), became the school's first dean of women. Northwestern admitted its first women students in 1869, and the first woman was graduated in 1874. Willard Residential College (1938) is named in her honor.
Northwestern fielded its first intercollegiate football team in 1882, later becoming a founding member of the Big Ten Conference. In the 1870s and 1880s, Northwestern affiliated itself with already existing schools of law, medicine, and dentistry in Chicago. As the university increased in wealth and distinction, and enrollments grew, these professional schools were integrated with the undergraduate college in Evanston; the result was a modern research university combining professional, graduate, and undergraduate programs, which gave equal weight to teaching and research. The Association of American Universities invited Northwestern to become a member in 1917.
Deering Library (1933)
Under Walter Dill Scott's presidency from 1920 to 1939, Northwestern began construction of an integrated campus in Chicago designed by James Gamble Rogers to house the professional schools; established the Kellogg School of Management; and built several prominent buildings on the Evanston campus, Dyche Stadium (now named Ryan Field) and Deering Library among others. In 1933, a proposal to merge Northwestern with the University of Chicago was considered but rejected. Northwestern played host to the first-ever NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship game in 1939 in the original Patten Gymnasium, later demolished and relocated farther north to make room for the Technological Institute.
University Hall (1869), the second building constructed on campus, and the oldest building still standing.
Like other American research universities, Northwestern was transformed by World War II. Franklyn B. Snyder led the university from 1939 to 1949, when nearly 50,000 military officers and personnel were trained on the Evanston and Chicago campuses. After the war, surging enrollments under the G.I. Bill drove drastic expansion of both campuses. In 1948 prominent anthropologist Melville J. Herskovits founded the Program of African Studies at Northwestern, the first center of its kind at an American academic institution. J. Roscoe Miller's tenure as president from 1949–1970 was responsible for the expansion of the Evanston campus, with the construction of the lakefill on Lake Michigan, growth of the faculty and new academic programs, as well as polarizing Vietnam-era student protests. In 1978, the first and second Unabomber attacks occurred at Northwestern University. Relations between Evanston and Northwestern were strained throughout much of the post-war era because of episodes of disruptive student activism, disputes over municipal zoning, building codes, and law enforcement, as well as restrictions on the sale of alcohol near campus until 1972. Northwestern's exemption from state and municipal property tax obligations under its original charter has historically been a source of town and gown tension.
Though government support for universities declined in the 1970s and 1980s, President Arnold R. Weber was able to stabilize university finances, leading to a revitalization of the campuses. As admissions to colleges and universities grew increasingly competitive in the 1990s and 2000s, President Henry S. Bienen's tenure saw a notable increase in the number and quality of undergraduate applicants, continued expansion of the facilities and faculty, and renewed athletic competitiveness. In 1999, Northwestern student journalists uncovered information exonerating Illinois death row inmate Anthony Porter two days before his scheduled execution, and the Innocence Project has since exonerated 10 more men. On January 11, 2003, in a speech at Northwestern School of Law's Lincoln Hall, then Governor of Illinois George Ryan announced that he would commute the sentences of more than 150 death row inmates.
The Latin phrase on Northwestern's seal, Quaecumque sunt vera (Whatsoever things are true) is drawn from the Epistle of Paul to the Philippians 4:8, while the Greek phrase inscribed on the pages of an open book is taken from the Gospel of John 1:14: ο λόγος πλήρης χάριτος και αληθείας (The Word full of grace and truth). Purple became Northwestern's official color in 1892, replacing black and gold after a university committee concluded that too many other universities had used these colors. Today, Northwestern's official color is purple, although white is something of an official color as well, being mentioned in both the university's earliest song, Alma Mater (1907) ("Hail to purple, hail to white") and in many university guidelines.
Campuses
Northwestern's Evanston campus is located on Lake Michigan.
Northwestern's Evanston campus, where the undergraduate schools, the Graduate School, and the Kellogg School of Management are located, runs north-south from Lincoln Avenue to Clark Street west of Lake Michigan along Sheridan Road. North and South Campuses have noticeably different atmospheres, owing to the predominance of Science and Athletics in the one and Humanities and Arts in the other. North Campus is home to the fraternity quads, the Henry Crown Sports Pavilion and Norris Aquatics Center and other athletic facilities, the Technological Institute, Dearborn Observatory, and other science-related buildings including Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Hall for Nanofabrication and Molecular Self-Assembly, and the Ford Motor Company Engineering Design Center. South Campus is home to the University's humanities buildings, Pick-Staiger Concert Hall and other music buildings, the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, and the sorority quads. In the 1960s, the University created an additional 84 acres (34.0 ha) by means of a lakefill in Lake Michigan. Among some of the buildings located on these broad new acres are University Library, Norris University Center (the student union), and Pick-Staiger Concert Hall.
The Chicago Transit Authority's elevated train running through Evanston is called the Purple Line, taking its name from Northwestern's school color. The Foster and Davis stations are within walking distance of the southern end of the campus, while the Noyes station is close to the northern end of the campus. The Central station is close to Ryan Field, Northwestern's football stadium. The Evanston Davis Street Metra station serves the Northwestern campus in downtown Evanston and the Evanston Central Street Metra station is near Ryan Field. Pace Suburban Bus Service and the CTA have several bus routes that run through or near the Evanston campus.
The Montgomery Ward Memorial Building (1927) at Northwestern's Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, America's first academic skyscraper.
Northwestern's Chicago campus is located in the city's Streeterville neighborhood. The Chicago campus is home to the medical school and affiliated hospitals, the law school, the part-time MBA program, and the School of Continuing Studies, which offers evening and weekend courses for working adults. Northwestern's professional schools and affiliated hospitals are about four blocks east of the Chicago station on the CTA Red Line. The Chicago campus is also served by CTA bus routes.
Founded at various times in the university's history, the professional schools originally were scattered throughout Chicago. In connection with a 1917 master plan for a central Chicago campus and President Walter D. Scott's capital campaign, 8.5 acres (3.44 ha) of land were purchased at the corner of Chicago Avenue and Lake Shore Drive for $1.5 million in 1920. The architect James Gamble Rogers was commissioned to create a master plan for the principal buildings on the new campus which he designed in collegiate gothic style. In 1923, Mrs. Montgomery Ward donated $8 million to the campaign to finance the construction of the Montgomery Ward Memorial Building which would house the medical and dental schools and to create endowments for faculty chairs, research grants, scholarships, and building maintenance. The building would become the first university skyscraper in the United States. In addition to the Ward Building, Rogers designed Wieboldt Hall to house facilities for the School of Commerce and Levy Mayer Hall to house the School of Law. The new campus comprising these three new buildings was dedicated during a two-day ceremony in June 1927. The Chicago campus continued to expand with the addition of Thorn Hall in 1931 and Abbott Hall in 1939.
Satellite Campus in Qatar
In Fall 2008, Northwestern opened a campus in Education City, Doha, Qatar, joining five other American universities: Carnegie Mellon University, Cornell University, Georgetown University, Texas A&M University, and Virginia Commonwealth University. Through the Medill School of Journalism and School of Communication, NU-Q offers bachelors degrees in journalism and communication respectively. The Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development provided funding for construction and administrative costs as well as support to hire 50 to 60 faculty and staff, some of whom rotate between the Evanston and Qatar campuses.
Sustainability
In January 2009, the Green Power Partnership (GPP, sponsored by the EPA) listed Northwestern as one of the top 10 universities in the country in purchasing energy from renewable sources. The university matches 74 million kilowatt hours (kWh) of its annual energy use with Green-e Certified Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs). This green power commitment represents 30 percent of the university's total annual electricity use and places Northwestern in the EPA's Green Power Leadership Club. The 2010 Report by The Sustainable Endowments Institute awarded Northwestern a “B-” on its College Sustainability Report Card. The Initiative for Sustainability and Energy at Northwestern (ISEN), supporting research, teaching and outreach in these themes, was launched in 2008.
Northwestern requires that all new buildings be LEED-certified. Silverman Hall on the Evanston campus was awarded Gold LEED Certification in 2010; Wieboldt Hall on the Chicago campus was awarded Gold LEED Certification in 2007, and the Ford Motor Company Engineering Design Center on the Evanston campus was awarded Silver LEED Certification in 2006. New construction and renovation projects will be designed to provide at least a 20% improvement over energy code requirements where technically feasible. The university also released at the beginning of the 2008-09 academic year the Evanston Campus Framework Plan, which outlines plans for future development of the Evanston Campus. The plan not only emphasizes the sustainable construction of buildings, but also discusses improving transportation by optimizing pedestrian and bicycle access. Northwestern has had a comprehensive recycling program in place since 1990. Annually more than 1,500 tons are recycled at Northwestern, which represents 30% of the waste produced on campus. Additionally, all landscape waste at the university is composted.
Organization and administration
Northwestern is privately owned and is governed by an appointed Board of Trustees. The board, composed of 70 members and as of 2011 chaired by William A. Osborn '69, delegates its power to an elected president to serve as the chief executive officer of the university. Northwestern has had sixteen presidents in its history (excluding interim presidents), the current president, Morton O. Schapiro, an economist, having succeeded Henry Bienen whose 14-year tenure ended on August 31, 2009. The president has a staff of vice presidents, directors, and other assistants for administrative, financial, faculty, and student matters. Daniel I. Linzer, provost since September 2007, serves under the president as the chief academic officer of the university to whom the deans of every academic school, leaders of cross-disciplinary units, and chairs of the standing faculty committee report.
The Associated Student Government consists of the elected representatives of the undergraduate students and the Graduate Student Association represents graduate students.
Northwestern University is composed of 12 schools and colleges. The faculty for each school consists of the dean of the school and the instructional faculty. Faculty are responsible for teaching, research, advising students, and serving on committees. Each school's admission requirements, degree requirements, courses of study, and disciplinary and degree recommendations are determined by the voting members of that school's faculty (assistant professor and above).
Northwestern's endowment was $7.2 billion as of Aug. 31, 2011, estimated as ninth among US and Canadian universities. In 2003, Northwestern finished a five-year capital campaign that raised $1.55 billion, $550 million more than its goal. In 2007, the university sold its royalty interest in the pain relief drug Lyrica for $700 million, a drug developed at Northwestern by Richard Bruce Silverman, the John Evans Professor of Chemistry. This was the largest such sale in history, the proceeds of which were added to the endowment.
Northwestern University had a dental school from 1891 to May 31, 2001, when it closed.
Academics
Northwestern is a large, residential research university. Accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools and the respective national professional organizations for chemistry, psychology, business, education, journalism, music, engineering, law, and medicine, the university offers 124 undergraduate programs and 145 graduate and professional programs. NU conferred 2,219 bachelors degrees, 2,971 masters degrees, 447 doctoral degrees, and 444 professional degrees in 2009–2010.
The four-year, full-time undergraduate program comprises the majority of enrollments at the university and emphasizes instruction in the arts and sciences, plus the professions of engineering, journalism, communication, music, and education Although a foundation in the liberal arts and sciences is required in all majors, there is no required common core curriculum; individual degree requirements are set by the faculty of each school. Northwestern's full-time undergraduate and graduate programs operate on an approximately 10-week academic quarter system with the academic year beginning in late September and ending in early June. Undergraduates typically take 4 courses each quarter and 12 courses in an academic year and are required to complete at least 12 quarters on campus to graduate. Northwestern offers honors, accelerated, and joint degree programs in medicine, science, mathematics, engineering, and journalism. The comprehensive doctoral graduate program has high coexistence with undergraduate programs.
Undergraduates with grade point averages in the highest 3 percent of each graduating class are awarded degrees summa cum laude, the next 5 percent magna cum laude, and the next 8 percent cum laude. Northwestern also has chapters of academic honor societies such as Phi Beta Kappa (Alpha of Illinois), Eta Kappa Nu, Tau Beta Pi, and Lambda Pi Eta. Since 1951, Northwestern has awarded 520 honorary degrees.
Undergraduate tuition for the 2010-2011 school year was $39,840. Northwestern awards financial aid solely on the basis of need through loans, work-study, grants, and scholarships. The University processed in excess of $472 million in financial aid for the 2009-2010 academic year. This included $265 million in institutional funds, with the remainder coming from federal and state governments and private organizations and individuals. Northwestern scholarship programs for undergraduate students support needy students from a variety of income and backgrounds. Approximately 44 percent of the June 2010 graduates had received federal and/or private loans for their undergraduate education, graduating with an average debt of $17,200.
Among the six undergraduate schools, 51.6% of undergraduate students are enrolled in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, 17.4% in the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science, 13.7% in the School of Communication, 8.1% in the Medill School of Journalism, 4.3% in the Bienen School of Music, and 4.9% in the School of Education and Social Policy. The five most commonly awarded undergraduate degrees are in economics, journalism, communication studies, psychology, and political science. While professional students are affiliated with their respective schools, full-time graduate academic degrees are primarily administered by the Graduate School. With 2,446 students enrolled in science, engineering, and health fields, the largest graduate programs by enrollment include chemistry, integrated biology, material sciences, electrical and computer engineering, neuroscience, and economics. The Kellogg School of Management's MBA, the School of Law's JD, and the Feinberg School of Medicine's MD are the three largest professional degree programs by enrollment.
Libraries and museums
University Library (1970) in Brutalist style.
The Northwestern library system consists of four libraries on the Evanston campus including the central University Library, three libraries on the Chicago campus, and the library affiliated with Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary. University Library contains over 4.9 million volumes, 4.6 million microforms, and almost 99,000 periodicals making it (by volume) the 30th-largest university library in North America and the 10th-largest library among private universities. Notable collections in the library system include the Melville J. Herskovits Library of African Studies, one of the largest Africana collections in the world, an extensive collection of early edition printed music and manuscripts as well as late-modern works, and an art collection noted for its 19th and 20th-century Western art and architecture periodicals. The library system participates with 15 other universities in digitizing its collections as a part of the Google Book Search project. The Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art is a major art museum in Chicago, containing more than 4,000 works in its permanent collection as well as dedicating a third of its space to temporary and traveling exhibitions.
In 2011, the Holocaust Educational Foundation, which had previously endowed the Theodore Zev Weiss – Holocaust Educational Foundation Professorship in Holocaust Studies, became part of Northwestern.
Research
Ford Motor Company Engineering Design Center (2005)
Northwestern was elected to the Association of American Universities in 1917 and remains a research university with "very high" research activity. Northwestern's schools of management, engineering, and communication are among the most academically productive in the nation. Northwestern received $511.7 million in research funding in 2011. Northwestern supports nearly 1,500 research laboratories across two campuses, predominately in the medical and biological sciences. Northwestern researchers disclosed 165 inventions, filed 76 patents applications, received 58 patents, started 4 companies, and generated $824.4 million in license income in 2009. The bulk of revenue has come from a patent on pregabalin, a synthesized organic molecule discovered by chemistry professor Richard Silverman, which ultimately was marketed as Lyrica, a drug sold by Pfizer, to combat epilepsy, neuropathic pain, and fibromyalgia. The Lyrica returns in 2008 pushed Northwestern into first place among universities in licensing income.
Northwestern is home to the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics, Northwestern Institute for Complex Systems, Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center, Materials Research Center, Institute for Policy Research, International Institute for Nanotechnology, Center for Catalysis and Surface Science, Buffet Center for International and Comparative Studies, the Initiative for Sustainability and Energy at Northwestern and the Argonne/Northwestern Solar Energy Research Center and other centers for interdisciplinary research.
Campus life
Traditions
The undergraduates have a number of traditions: Painting The Rock (originally a fountain donated by the Class of 1902) is a way to advertise, for example, campus organizations, events in Greek life, student groups, and university-wide events. Dance Marathon, a 30-hour philanthropic event, has raised more than 13 million dollars in its history for various children's charities. Primal Scream is held at 9 p.m. on the Sunday before finals week every quarter; students lean out of windows or gather in courtyards and scream. Armadillo Day, or, more popularly, Dillo Day, is held on Northwestern's Lakefill every Spring on the weekend after Memorial Day.
There are traditions long associated with football games. Students growl like wildcats when the opposing team controls the ball, while simulating a claw with their hands. They will also jingle keys at the beginning of each kickoff. In the past, before the tradition was discontinued, students would throw marshmallows during games. The Clock Tower at the Rebecca Crown Center glows purple, instead of its usual white, after a winning game, thereby proclaiming the happy news. The Clock Tower remains purple until a loss or until the end of the sports season. Whereas formerly the Clock Tower was lighted only for football victories, wins for men's basketball and women's lacrosse now merit commemoration as well; important victories in other sports may also prompt an empurpling.
Media
The Daily Northwestern is the main student newspaper. Established in 1881, and published on weekdays during the academic year, it is directed entirely by undergraduates. Although it serves the Northwestern community, the Daily has no business ties to the university, being supported wholly by advertisers. It is owned by the Students Publishing Company. Current circulation is in excess of 7,500.[citation needed]
Politics & Policy was founded at Northwestern and is dedicated to the analysis of current events and public policy. Begun in 2010 by students in the Weinberg College, School of Communication, and Medill School, the organization reaches students on more than two hundred and fifty college campuses around the world. Run entirely by undergraduates, Politics & Policy publishes several times a week with material ranging from short summaries of events to extended research pieces. The organization is funded in part by the Buffett Center.
North by Northwestern is an online undergraduate magazine, having been established in September 2006 by students at the Medill School. It's published on weekdays, with updates on news stories and special events inserted throughout the day and on weekends. North by Northwestern also publishes a quarterly print magazine, recently honored by the Society of Professional Journalists as the nation's best student magazine.
WNUR (89.3 FM) is a 7,200 watt radio station that broadcasts to Chicago and its northern suburbs. WNUR's programming consists of music – jazz, classical, rock – varsity sports (football, men's and women's basketball, baseball, softball, and women's lacrosse), breaking news on weekdays, politics, current events, and literature.[citation needed]
Northwestern News Network, commonly known as NNN, is a student-produced television news report. It broadcasts news and sports programming three days a week during the academic year on NU Channel 1, online at nnntv.org, and weeknights at 10 p.m. on Evanston Public-access television cable TV channel 6.[citation needed]
Syllabus is the undergraduate yearbook. First published in 1885, the yearbook is an epitome of that year's events at Northwestern. Published by Students Publishing Company and edited by Northwestern students, it is distributed in late May.
Northwestern Flipside is an undergraduate satirical magazine. Founded in 2009, The Flipside publishes a weekly issue both in print and online.
Helicon is the university's undergraduate literary magazine. Started in 1979, it is published twice a year, a web issue in the Winter, and a print issue with a web complement in the Spring.
TriQuarterly Online (formerly TriQuarterly) is a literary magazine published twice a year featuring poetry, fiction, nonfiction, drama, literary essays, reviews, a blog, and graphic art. [3]
Studio 22 is Northwestern's student-run production company which produces roughly ten films per year. The organization, for example, financed the first film Zach Braff directed and has produced many films in which students who would go on to successful acting careers performed, including Zach Gilford of the TV show, Friday Night Lights.
Performing arts
Two annual productions are especially notable: the Waa-Mu show, and the Dolphin show. Waa-Mu is an original musical, written and produced almost entirely by students. Children's theater is represented on campus by Griffin’s Tale and Purple Crayon Players.[citation needed] Its umbrella organization—the Student Theatre Coalition, or StuCo—organizes nine student theatre companies, plus some other performance groups.[citation needed] Students produce more than sixty independent productions each year.[citation needed] Many Northwestern alumni have used these productions as stepping stones to successful television and film careers. Chicago's Lookingglass Theatre, for example, which began life in the Great Room in Jones Residential College, was founded in 1988 by several alumni, including David Schwimmer; in 2011, it won the Regional Tony Award.[citation needed]
Northwestern also has a variety of improv groups. The improv and sketch comedy group Mee-Ow created by Paul Warshauer and Josh Lazar in 1974 lists Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Ana Gasteyer, Dermot Mulroney, Seth Meyers, John Cameron Mitchell, and Kristen Schaal among its alumni. Mee-Ow, The Titanic Players, and Out da Box, a multicultural comedy show, together with Northwestern's theatre department, have brought attention to Northwestern's improv comedy training and performance.[citation needed]
There are seventeen a cappella groups and a variety of dance companies on campus. The dance companies include Fusion Dance Company, Northwestern's premiere Hip-Hop Dance Crew; ReFresH Dance Crew, an open dance community that offers free hip-hop choreography and freestyling lessons; Graffiti Dancers, a dance group that focuses on jazz and modern; and Boomshaka, Northwestern's premiere drum and dance ensemble, combining body rhythm, drumming, and dance. Radio drama featuring student voice actors is a staple of WNUR's programming.
Debate Society
The Northwestern Debate Society is a policy debate team which has won fourteen National Debate Tournaments, the highest number of any university. Famous alumni of the Society include Erwin Chemerinsky and Elliot Mincberg, the latter senior vice president, general counsel and legal director of People For the American Way. Scott Deatherage, the head coach, was named the Coach of the Nineties.
Service
Many students are involved in community service in one form or another. Annual events include Dance Marathon, a thirty-hour event that raised more than a million dollars for charity in 2011; and Project Pumpkin, a Halloween celebration hosted by the Northwestern Community Development Corps (NCDC) to which more than 800 local children are invited for an afternoon of games and sweets. NCDC's work is to connect hundreds of student volunteers to some twenty volunteer sites in Evanston and Chicago throughout the year.[citation needed] Many students have assisted with the Special Olympics and have taken alternative spring break trips to hundreds of service sites across the United States.[citation needed] Northwestern students also participate in the Freshman Urban Program, a program for students interested in community service.[citation needed] A large and growing number of students participate in the university's Global Engagement Summer Institute (GESI), a group service-learning expedition in Asia, Africa, or Latin America, in conjunction with the Foundation for Sustainable Development. Several internationally recognized non-profit organizations have originated at Northwestern including the World Health Imaging, Informatics and Telemedicine Alliance, a spin-off from an engineering student's honors thesis.
Undergraduate housing
See also: List of Northwestern University residences
Northwestern has several housing options, including both traditional residence halls and residential colleges which gather together students who have a particular intellectual interest in common. Among the residential colleges are the Residential College of Cultural and Community Studies (CCS), Ayers College of Commerce and Industry, Jones Residential College (Arts), Slivka Residential College (Science and Engineering), the International Studies Residential College, Communications Residential College (CRC), and the Public Affairs Residential College (PARC). In Fall 2007, 27% of undergraduates were affiliated with a fraternity or sorority. Northwestern recognizes 21 fraternities and 18 sororities.
Athletics
Main article: Northwestern Wildcats
2005 NCAA Women's Lacrosse Championship game between the Virginia Cavaliers and Northwestern Wildcats
Northwestern is a charter member of the Big Ten Conference and the only private institution in the conference. Northwestern fields 19 intercollegiate athletic teams (8 men's and 11 women's) in addition to numerous club sports. The women's lacrosse team won five consecutive NCAA national championships between 2005 and 2009, went undefeated in 2005 and 2009, added another NCAA championship in 2011, and holds several scoring records. The men's basketball team is recognized by the Helms Athletic Foundation as the 1931 National Champion. In the 2010-11 school year, the Wildcats had one national championship, 12 teams in postseason play, 20 All-Americans, two CoSIDA Academic All-American selections, 8 CoSIDA Academic All0District selections, 1 conference Coach of the Year and Player of the Year, 53 All-Conference and a record 201 Academic All-Big Ten athletes. Overall, 12 of Northwestern's 19 varsity programs had NCAA or bowl postseason appearances.
The football team plays at Ryan Field (formerly known as Dyche Stadium); the basketball and volleyball teams play at Welsh-Ryan Arena. Northwestern's athletic teams are nicknamed the Wildcats. Before 1924, they were known as "The Purple" and unofficially as "The Fighting Methodists." The name Wildcats was bestowed upon the university in 1924 by Wallace Abbey, a writer for the Chicago Daily Tribune who wrote that even in a loss to the University of Chicago, "Football players had not come down from Evanston; wildcats would be a name better suited to [Coach Glenn] Thistletwaite's boys." The name was so popular that university board members made "wildcats" the official nickname just months later. In 1972, the student body voted to change the official nickname from "Wildcats" to "Purple Haze" but the new name never stuck.
The mascot of Northwestern Athletics is Willie the Wildcat. The first mascot, however, was a live, caged bear cub from the Lincoln Park Zoo named Furpaw who was brought to the playing field on the day of a game to greet the fans. But after a losing season, the team, deciding that Furpaw was to blame for its misfortune, banished him from campus forever. Willie the Wildcat made his debut in 1933 first as a logo, and then in three dimensions in 1947, when members of the Alpha Delta fraternity dressed as wildcats during a Homecoming Parade. The Northwestern University Marching Band (NUMB) performs at all home football games and leads cheers in the student section and performs the Alma Mater at the end of the game.
Ryan Field (1926), Northwestern's 49,000 seat football stadium
Northwestern's football team has made 73 appearances in the top 10 of the AP poll since 1936 (including 5 at #1) and has won eight Big Ten conference championships since 1903. At one time, Northwestern had the longest losing streak in Division I-A, losing 34 consecutive games between 1979 and 1982. The team did not appear in a bowl game after 1949 until the 1996 Rose Bowl. Despite playing in the 1996 Rose Bowl, 1997 Citrus Bowl, 2000 Alamo Bowl, 2003 Motor City Bowl, 2005 Sun Bowl, 2009 Alamo Bowl, 2010 Outback Bowl, 2011 TicketCity Bowl, and 2011 Texas Bowl, the last bowl game Northwestern won was the 1949 Rose Bowl. Following the sudden death of football coach Randy Walker in 2006, 31-year-old former All-American Northwestern linebacker Pat Fitzgerald assumed the position, becoming the youngest Division I FBS coach at the time.
In 1998, two former Northwestern basketball players were charged and convicted for sports bribery as a result of being paid to shave points in games against three other Big 10 schools during the 1995 season. The football team became embroiled in a different betting scandal later that year when federal prosecutors indicted four former players for perjury related to betting on their own games. In August 2001, Rashidi Wheeler, a senior safety, collapsed and died during practice from an asthma attack. An autopsy revealed that he had ephedrine, a stimulant banned by the NCAA, in his system, which prompted Northwestern to investigate the prevalence of stimulants and other banned substances across all of its athletic programs. In 2006, the Northwestern women's soccer team was suspended and coach Jenny Haigh resigned following the release of images of alleged hazing.
People
Student body
Demographics of student body
Undergraduate Postgraduate U.S. Census
African American
5.3% 4.3% 12.1%
Asian American
18.6% 9.6% 4.3%
White American
56.0% 47.6% 65.8%
Hispanic American
7.6% 4.8% 14.5%
Native American
0.1% 0.2% 0.9%
International student
5.7% 19.3% N/A
Northwestern enrolled 8,367 full-time undergraduate and 8,108 full-time graduate and professional students in the 2010-11 academic year, along with approximately 1,100 part-time students. The undergraduate population is drawn from the 50 states and from some 50 foreign countries. Admissions are characterized as "more selective, lower transfer-in". There were over 32,000 applications for the undergraduate Class of 2016 (entering 2012): 15% were admitted The interquartile range on the SAT was 2030–2290 and 90% ranked in the top ten percent of their high school class. In 2007, Northwestern enrolled 249 National Merit Scholars as freshmen, the third-largest total in the nation. 86% of students were graduated after four years, 92% after five years, the university having several five-year programs.
Faculty
Main article: List of Northwestern University faculty
The university employs 2,291 full-time faculty members across its eleven schools including 18 members of the National Academy of Sciences, 65 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,19 members of the National Academy of Engineering, and 6 members of the Institute of Medicine Notable faculty include 2010 Nobel Prize- winning economist Dale T. Mortensen; nano-scientist Chad Mirkin; Tony Award-winning director Mary Zimmerman; management expert Philip Kotler; King Faisal International Prize in Science recipient Sir Fraser Stoddart; Steppenwolf Theatre director Anna Shapiro; sexual psychologist J. Michael Bailey; Holocaust denier Arthur Butz; Federalist Society co-founder Steven Calabresi; former Weatherman Bernardine Rae Dohrn; ethnographer Gary Alan Fine; Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Garry Wills; and MacArthur Fellowship recipients Stuart Dybek, and Jennifer Richeson. Notable former faculty include political advisor David Axelrod, artist Ed Paschke, writer Charles Newman, Nobel Prize-winning chemist John Pople, and military sociologist and "don't ask, don't tell" author Charles Moskos.
Alumni
Main article: List of Northwestern University alumni
Charlton Heston, Academy Award-winning actor, National Rifle Association President, B.S. '45
Northwestern has roughly 225,000 alumni in all branches of business, government, law, science, education, medicine, media, and the performing arts. Among Northwestern's more notable alumni are U.S. Senator and presidential candidate George McGovern, Nobel Prize-winning economist George J. Stigler, Nobel Prize-winning novelist Saul Bellow, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and diarist Ned Rorem, the much-decorated composer Howard Hanson, Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey Ali Babacan, the historian and novelist Wilma Dykeman, and the founder of the presidential prayer breakfast Abraham Vereide. U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice John Paul Stevens, Supreme Court Justice and Ambassador to the United Nations Arthur Joseph Goldberg, and Governor of Illinois and Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson are among the graduates of the Northwestern School of Law. Many Northwestern alumni play or have played important roles in Chicago and Illinois, such as former Illinois governor and convicted felon Rod Blagojevich, Chicago Bulls and Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf, and theater director Mary Zimmerman. Northwestern alumnus David J. Skorton currently serves as president of Cornell University. Rahm Emanuel, the mayor of Chicago and former White House Chief of Staff, earned a Masters in Speech and Communication in 1985.
Northwestern's School of Communication has been especially fruitful in the number of actors, actresses, playwrights, and film and television writers and directors it has produced. Alumni who have made their mark on film and television include Ann-Margret, Warren Beatty, Paul Lynde, David Schwimmer, Anne Dudek, Zach Braff, Zooey Deschanel, Marg Helgenberger, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jerry Orbach, Jennifer Jones, Jerry Springer, Megan Mullally, John Cameron Mitchell, Dermot Mulroney, Charlton Heston, Richard Kind, Ana Gasteyer, Brad Hall, Shelley Long, William Daniels, Cloris Leachman, Bonnie Bartlett, Paula Prentiss, Richard Benjamin, Laura Innes, Charles Busch, Stephanie March, Tony Roberts, Jeri Ryan, Kimberly Williams-Paisley, McLean Stevenson, Tony Randall, Charlotte Rae, Patricia Neal, Nancy Dussault, Robert Reed, Mara Brock Akil, Greg Berlanti, Dan Shor, Seth Meyers, Frank DeCaro, Zach Gilford, Nicole Sullivan, Stephen Colbert and Garry Marshall. Directors who were graduated from Northwestern include Gerald Freedman, Stuart Hagmann, Marshall W. Mason, and Mary Zimmerman. Lee Phillip Bell hosted a talk show in Chicago from 1952–1986 and co-created the Daytime Emmy Award-winning soap operas The Young and the Restless in 1973 and The Bold and the Beautiful in 1987. Alumni such as Sheldon Harnick, Stephanie D'Abruzzo, Heather Headley, Kristen Schaal, Lily Rabe, and Walter Kerr have distinguished themselves on Broadway, as has designer Bob Mackie. Amsterdam-based comedy theater Boom Chicago was founded by Northwestern alumni, and the school has become a training ground for future The Second City, I.O., ComedySportz, Mad TV and Saturday Night Live talent. Tam Spiva wrote scripts for The Brady Bunch and Gentle Ben. In New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago, the number of Northwestern alumni involved in theater, film, and television is so large that a perception has formed that there's such a thing as a "Northwestern mafia."
The Medill School of Journalism has produced notable journalists and political activists including 38 Pulitzer Prize laureates. National correspondents, reporters and columnists such as The New York Times's Elisabeth Bumiller, David Barstow, Dean Murphy, and Vincent Laforet, USA Today's Gary Levin, Susan Page and Christine Brennan, NBC correspondent Kelly O'Donnell, CBS correspondent Richard Threlkeld, CNN correspondents Nicole Lapin and Joie Chen, and ESPN personalities Rachel Nichols, Michael Wilbon, Mike Greenberg, Steve Weissman, J. A. Adande, and Kevin Blackistone. The bestselling author of the A Song of Ice and Fire series, George R. R. Martin, earned a B.S. and M.S. from Medill.
Northwestern alumni involved in music include Steve Albini, Thomas Tyra, Andrew Bird, Joshua Radin, members of Arcade Fire, The Lawrence Arms, Chavez, and OK Go. Lastly, Northwestern alumni involved in professional sports include Rick Sund (NBA), Billy McKinney (NBA), Mark Loretta (MLB), Joe Girardi (MLB), Luis Castillo (NFL), Ernie Adams (NFL), Otto Graham (NFL), three-time Olympic medalist Matt Grevers, and PGA Tour star Luke Donald.