Northeastern Illinois University

Northeastern Illinois University (NEIU) is a public state university located in Chicago, Illinois. The main campus is located in the community area of North Park with three additional campuses in the metropolitan area. Tracing its founding to 1867, it was first established as a separate branch of a public college in 1949. NEIU serves 12,000 students in the region and is a federally designated Hispanic Serving Institution.

NEIU has one of the longest running free form community radio stations, WZRD Chicago 88.3 FM.

History
The origins of the school can be traced to Cook County Normal School (now Chicago State University), which was founded in 1867 in Englewood, Illinois. That school became known as Chicago Teachers College after three name changes.

In 1949, a branch of Chicago Teachers College was established on the North Side of Chicago. Chicago Teachers College (North Side) relocated to the present site of the university in 1961. The school changed its name again in 1965 to Illinois Teachers' College: Chicago North after the state of Illinois assumed control of the college.

In 1967, the college became an independent institution as Northeastern Illinois State College.

In 1971, Northeastern Illinois was granted university status. It was given a mandate by the Illinois Legislature "to offer such courses of instruction as shall best serve to qualify teachers for the schools of the State; and to offer such other courses of instruction, conduct such research and offer such public services as are prescribed by the Board of Governors of State Colleges and Universities or its successor."

In January 1996, Northeastern Illinois University established its own Board of Trustees.

The school's demographics are: 41% White, 30% Hispanic, 10% African American, 8.5% Asian and 10.5% other/unknown.

Admissions
To be eligible for admission, prospective undergraduate students must meet the following requirements:

Freshman Admission Requirements: Students are eligible for admission if they have graduated or will graduate from high school and rank in the upper half of your graduating class. The ACT or SAT is required if the student is under 21 years of age. If the student is not in the upper half of their high school graduating class, a minimum composite score of 19 on the ACT or a minimum score of 890 on the SAT are need to qualify for admission. If the student is 18 years of age or older, they can be considered for admission upon successful completion of the GED.

Transfer Admission Requirements: Students are eligible for admission if they have earned a cumulative grade point average of 2.0 or higher for all college work attempted and are in good standing at the last college attended. If the student has earned fewer than 24 semester hours of college credit, they must also meet the freshman admission requirements.

Alumni
Each year NEIU graduates approximately 1,800 new alumni.

Degree programs


Undergraduate and Master's degrees are offered in three colleges: College of Arts and Sciences, College of Business and Management, and the College of Education.

Athletics


Northeastern Illinois competed in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for 20 years until joining the more high-profile National Collegiate Athletic Association in 1988. After a transitional season at the Division II level, NEIU moved its athletic program to Division I.

The Golden Eagles played as independents until finding a place in the short-lived East Coast Conference for the 1993-94 campaign. Northeastern Illinois were then invited to join the Mid-Continent Conference, now known as the Summit League, where it would play for the next four years.

Chief among the highlights of this era was the baseball team's 1996 Mid-Continent Conference championship and NCAA Tournament bid. Men's basketball player Andrell Hoard won the ESPN National Slam Dunk Competition, women's basketball coach Denise Taylor was chosen to lead the Utah Starzz of the WNBA in 1997 and women's basketball player Delores Jones was a participant in the 1998 WNBA draft.

Whether the University should really be investing in such an expensive venture as intercollegiate athletics was a constant question among administrators and faculty members for the better part of a decade. Northeastern Illinois chose to discontinue its sports programs after the 1997-98 season.

Many years ago, the school's football team was a charter member of the Division III Illini-Badger Football Conference, where it won five conference titles before dropping the sport in 1988.

Even earlier, in 1977, a men's club soccer team was formed by students from local soccer organizations around Chicago to compete against college varsities from surrounding region. This club, guided by player/coach Frank Hermantz, won all of its games. Varsity status was not granted, however, and the team parted ways.

In 2005, a group of students created a new NEIU baseball club. The Eagles were made up of 24 current students who competed against other collegiate baseball clubs in the Midwest including programs at Columbia College Chicago, Northwestern University, Roosevelt University, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

In addition to the baseball club, the University also has other programs such as women's volleyball, women's soccer, men's soccer, aikido, Brazilian jujitsu, ice hockey, and women's softball. All sports clubs are created and organized by students with the support of the campus recreation department.

Notable faculty

 * Sarah Hoagland, Philosophy
 * Conrad Worrill
 * John R. Powers
 * Libby Komaiko, Dance
 * Edward Stuart, Economics; Frequent guest on Chicago Tonight

Notable alumni

 * Muhammed al-Ahari, Islamic essayist and scholar
 * Lorrainne Sade Baskerville, Social worker and activist
 * Michael Angelo Batio, Guitarist
 * Maria Antonia Berrios, Member of the Illinois House of Representatives
 * Bob Biggins, Member of the Illinois House of Representatives
 * Candy Dawson Boyd, writer & activist
 * Walter Burnett, Jr., Chicago Alderman
 * Prince Nguyen Phuc Buu Chanh, President of the Vietnamese Constitutional Monarchist League
 * Dan Crawford, Professional basketball referee
 * John C. D'Amico, Member of the Illinois House of Representatives
 * Jesse Davis, Saxophonist
 * Miguel del Valle, Chicago City Clerk; former Illinois State Senator
 * Sara Feigenholtz, Member of the Illinois House of Representatives
 * Calvin L. Giles, Former member of the Illinois House of Representatives
 * Luis V. Gutiérrez, first Latino to be elected to Congress from the Midwest.
 * Alan Hargesheimer, Major League Baseball pitcher
 * Robert Jordan, veteran journalist and news anchor for WGN-TV in Chicago
 * Margaret Laurino, Chicago Alderman
 * Richard C. Lindberg, Chicago Author, Historian and Journalist
 * Iris Y. Martinez, Illinois State Senator
 * Tim McIlrath, singer of Rise Against
 * Art Porter, Jr., Saxophonist
 * Dr. Christopher J. Schneider, professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia
 * Ed H. Smith, Chicago Alderman
 * Karen Yarbrough, Member of the Illinois House of Representatives