| University of Massachusetts Lowell | |
|---|---|
| Established | 1975 after merger of the Lowell Technological Institute and Lowell State College |
| Type | Public |
| Chancellor | Marty Meehan |
| President | Robert L. Caret |
| Provost | Ahmed Abdelal |
| Academic staff | 737 Full and Part-Time (Fall 2009) |
| Admin. staff | 740 Full and Part-Time (Fall 2009) |
| Students | 14,702 (2010) |
| Location | Lowell, Massachusetts, USA |
| Campus | Urban 150 acres |
| Colors | Persian Red Pigment Blue White |
| Nickname | River Hawks |
| Mascot | Rowdy the River Hawk |
| Website | www.uml.edu |
The University of Massachusetts Lowell (also known as UMass Lowell or UML) is a public university in Lowell, Massachusetts, and part of the University of Massachusetts system. With more than 640 faculty members and more than 14,000 students, it is the largest university in the Merrimack Valley, the third-largest state institution behind UMass Amherst and UMass Boston.
The university offers more than 120 degree choices, internships, bachelor’s to master’s programs and doctoral studies in the colleges of Arts and Sciences, Engineering and Management, the School of Health and Environment, and the Graduate School of Education.
UMass Lowell's men's hockey program has produced numerous professional players for the National Hockey League.
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The University of Lowell was formed in the 1975 merger of Lowell Technological Institute (1895) and Lowell State College (1894). Their respective campuses became the North Campus and South Campus of the new institution, which was merged into the University of Massachusetts system in 1991 and renamed as the University of Massachusetts Lowell. The two original colleges had grown from humble beginnings as the Lowell Textile Institute, founded in 1895 to train technicians and managers for the textile industry, and the Lowell Normal School, founded in 1894 as a teacher-training college.[1]
UMass Lowell is well-known for its science and engineering programs, including several "on the rise" technologies (e.g., the field of nanotechnology). It is the first university in the United States to offer a bachelor's degree in plastics engineering, and it is one of a few public universities in the United States to offer degrees in meteorology and sound recording technology. UMass Lowell has a radiation laboratory with a research reactor and Van De Graff accelerator that provides students with real-world experience in particle physics, nuclear engineering and health physics. UMass Lowell is also the first university to offer a master's degree in sound recording technology (SRT). The university also boasts a baseball research center that is the official baseball bat testing center for Major League Baseball.
UMass Lowell's College of Management has a diverse cirriculum in the fields of finance, marketing, management information systems, operations and more.
In 2011, the University of Massachusetts system was ranked 19th in the world by the Times of London World University Rankings.
UMass Lowell specifically was ranked 183rd on the Tier 1 National University Ranking of the Best Colleges of 2011 by the US News and World Report.[2] UMass Amherst was ranked 99th, and UMass Boston and Dartmouth did not make the list.[3]
In the same report, UMass Lowell ranked 101st in the Top Public National Universities Ranking, and second among public universities in Massachusetts. [4]
The Big Seven are the main organizations on campus funded directly from the student activities fee (other student organizations have budgets granted through the Student Government Association). They are:
Some of the other student organizations include:
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East Campus
North Campus
South Campus
Other locations
Downtown
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University housing is home to 3,147 students, including 504 in the UMass Lowell Inn & Conference Center (formerly the Doubletree Hotel), which opened in September 2009. Sixty-eight percent of the freshmen class live in university housing, according to the official web site. In addition, the university owns two apartment complexes located at East Meadow Lane, which houses graduates, students with families, and 21+ undergraduates.
East Campus
North Campus
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South Campus
Off Campus Apartments
Downtown
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UMass Lowell athletic teams compete in a variety of sports. Men and women compete in Division II, with the exception of men's hockey, which competes in Division I. The men's sports include baseball, basketball, cross country, golf, ice hockey, track and field, and soccer. The women's sports are basketball, cross country, track and field, field hockey, soccer, rowing, softball, and volleyball. The university's men's hockey team plays in the Hockey East conference, and play their games at the Tsongas Center at UMass Lowell. Past champions include the 1988 men's basketball team, the 1991 men's cross country team, the ice hockey team (three times), and the field hockey team twice (2005, 2010). The 2010 team finished a perfect 24-0. The nickname "River Hawks" came about during the school's transition into UMass Lowell, and was inspired by the campus's location by the Merrimack River. The University of Lowell's nickname was the Chiefs, which was abandoned in favor of the current name. A campus-wide poll was conducted for student input and final candidates included the Ospreys and the Raging Rapids, according to the Connector student newspaper.
Total enrollment for 2011 is 14,702, an increase of more than 1,100 students from the previous year. In-state enrollment totals 92 percent of undergraduates and 71 percent of graduate students. International students are 1 percent of the undergraduate population and 14 percent of the graduate population. Students of color are 21 percent of the total undergraduate population and 18 percent of the graduate population. The male-female ratio is 60/40 for undergraduates and 52/48 for the graduate population. The total enrollment is up by more than 30 percent from 2007.[5]
Located in the historic industrial city of Lowell, 25 miles (40 km) northwest of Boston, the campus spans 150 acres (0.61 km2) along the Merrimack River. UMass Lowell has three campus clusters – North, South and East. Of the 14,702 students at UMass Lowell, approximately two-thirds are commuters. The university has increased student housing by more than 800 beds in the last three years and plans to add more residence halls in the next few years.
UMass Lowell and the city reached an agreement in 2009 for the school to acquire the Tsongas Arena and the 3 acres (12,000 m2) of land adjacent to it. The transfer was finalized in February 2010. The university bought the DoubleTree Hotel in downtown Lowell in 2009. It is now used for student housing and to house major events for the university, as well as business and cultural events, conferences and more. The building is called the UMass Lowell Inn & Conference Center.
The university broke ground in June 2010 on the new Emerging Technologies Innovation Center, the first new academic building built on campus in 30 years. The building, which will be located on the former site of Smith Hall (demolished in July 2010), will cost $70 million with half of the funding coming from the state. On March 30, 2011, the university held a topping-off ceremony marking the completion of the ETIC's steel frame. The ceremony also included the opening of a time capsule that was placed in the cornerstone of Smith Hall during its 1947 construction, as well as the compilation of a new time capsule to be included in the ETIC.
In July 2009, the Massachusetts legislature eliminated more than $1 million in funding for the state's Toxic Use Reduction Institute (TURI) from the state budget. TURI is based on the UMass Lowell campus. In October 2009, it was announced that the university had secured federal stimulus funds that would enable the institute open through the end of the fiscal year on June 30, 2010. TURI continues to operate today.
In January 2011, the university announced that it had acquired the old St. Joseph's Hospital in Lowell for $6.3 million. The complex, renamed University Crossing, consists of six buildings and approximately 300,000 square feet (28,000 m2) of developable space. The university has not announced final plans for the property, but discussions include a student center, food court, bookstore, faculty offices and more. The University Police and some administrative functions will be the first to move to the site. A task force that includes representatives of the surrounding neighborhood and the city has been formed to discuss the future of the property. The facility is located near the university's North, South and East campuses and will serve as a central point uniting all three. [6][7][8]
The university broke ground in April 2011 on the new Health and Social Sciences Building on South Campus. The 69,000-square-foot (6,400 m2) building, construction of which is funded by the state's Higher Education Bond Bill of 2008, will be home to three of the university's most popular majors: criminal justice, nursing and psychology.
On November 1st 2011 the university broke ground on a 16 million dollar garage on the North Campus. The garage is a six story, 650 space garage that will be finished in the fall of 2012. The university is also planning to construct a parking facility on the South campus, as well as a new student residence hall on East Campus and a new College of Management building on North Campus.
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