Boston University

Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian but is historically affiliated with the United Methodist Church The university has more than 3,800 faculty members and 33,000 students, and is one of Boston's largest employers.It offers bachelor's degrees master's degrees, and doctorates, and medical dental, business, and law degrees through eighteen schools and colleges on two urban campuses. The main campus is situated along the Charles River in Boston's Fen way-Kenmore and Alston neighborhoods, while the Boston University Medical Campus is in Boston's South End neighborhood.Boston University is categorized as an RU/VH Research University very high research activity in the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. BU is a member of the Boston Consortium for Higher Education and the Association of American Universities.The university counts seven Nobel Laureates, twenty-three Pulitzer Prize winners, nine Academy Award winners, and several Emmy and Tony Award winners among its faculty and alumni. BU also has MacArthur Sloan, and Guggenheim Fellowship holders as well as American Academy of Arts and Sciences and National Academy of Sciences members among its past and present graduates and faculty.The Boston University Terriers compete in the NCAA's Division I. BU athletic teams compete in the Patriot League, and Hockey East conferences and their mascot is Hettie the Boston Terrier. Boston University is well known for men's hockey, in which it has won five national championships, most recently in 2009.Boston University traces its roots to the establishment of the New bury Biblical Institute in New bury, Vermont in 1839, and was chartered with the name "Boston University" by the Massachusetts Legislature in 1869. The University organized formal Centennial observances both in 1939 and 1969.On April 24–25, 1839 a group of Methodist ministers and laymen at the Old Bloomfield Street Church in Boston elected to establish a Methodist theological school. Set up in New bury, Vermont, the school was named the New bury Biblical Institute.In 1847, the Congregational Society in Concord, New Hampshire, invited the Institute to relocate to Concord and offered a disused Congregational church building with a capacity of 1200 people. Other citizens of Concord covered the remodeling costs. One stipulation of the invitation was that the Institute remain in Concord for at least 20 years. The charter issued by New Hampshire designated the school the Methodist General Biblical Institute", but it was commonly called the Concord Biblical Institute.With the agreed twenty years coming to a close, the Trustees of the Concord Biblical Institute purchased 30 acres (120,000 m2) on Walloping Hill in Brook line, Massachusetts as a possible relocation site. The Institute moved in 1867 to 23 Pinkeye Street in Boston and received a Massachusetts Charter as the "Boston Theological Institute.In January 1872 Isaac Rich died, leaving the vast bulk of his estate to a trust that would go to Boston University after ten years of growth while the University was organized. Most of this bequest consisted of real estate throughout the core of the city of Boston and was appraised at more than $1.5 million. Gilmore describes this as the largest single donation to an American college or university to that time. By December, however, the Great Boston Fire of 1872 had destroyed all but one of the buildings Rich had left to the University, and the insurance companies with which they had been insured were bankrupt. The value of his estate, when turned over to the University in 1882, was half what it had been in 1872. As a result, the University was unable to build its contemplated campus on Walloping Hill and the land was sold piecemeal as development sites. Street names in the area, including Clinical Road Clinical Path, and University Road, are the only remaining evidence of University ownership in this area.
     
The University's main Charles River Campus follows Commonwealth Avenue and the Green Line, beginning near Kenmore Square and continuing for over a mile and a half to its end near the border of Boston's Alston neighborhood. The Boston University Bridge over the Charles River into Cambridge represents the dividing line between Main Campus, where most schools and classroom buildings are concentrated and West Campus, home to several athletic facilities and playing fields, the large West Campus dorm, and the new John Hancock Student Village complex.As a result of its continual expansion the Charles River campus contains an array of architecturally diverse buildings. The College of Arts and Sciences Marsh Chapel site of the Marsh Chapel Experiment and the School of Theology buildings are the university's most recognizable and were built in the late-1930s and 1940s in collegiate Gothic style. A sizable amount of the campus is traditional Boston brownstone, especially at Bay State Road and South Campus where BU has acquired almost every townhouse those areas offer. The buildings are primarily dormitories but many also serve as various institutes as well as department offices. From the 1960s–1980s many contemporary buildings were constructed including the Sugar Library, BU Law School and Warren Towers, all of which were built in the brutality style of architecture. The Met calf Science Center for Science and Engineering constructed in 1983 might more accurately be described as Structural Expressionism. Morse Auditorium, adjacent, stands in stark architectural contrast, as it was constructed as a Jewish temple. The most recent additions to BU's campus are the Phonics Center, Life Science and Engineering Building, The Student Village which includes the Fit Rec Center and Paganism Arena and the School of Management. All these buildings were built in brick a few with a substantial amount of brownstone.