The Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts & Sciences is an academic division of the
Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...
, a
private
Private or privates may refer to:
Music
* " In Private", by Dusty Springfield from the 1990 album ''Reputation''
* Private (band), a Denmark-based band
* "Private" (Ryōko Hirosue song), from the 1999 album ''Private'', written and also recorde ...
research university
A research university or a research-intensive university is a university that is committed to research as a central part of its mission. They are the most important sites at which knowledge production occurs, along with "intergenerational kno ...
in
Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...
. The school is located on the university's
Homewood campus The Homewood Campus is the main academic and administrative center of the Johns Hopkins University. It is located at 3400 North Charles Street in Baltimore, Maryland. It houses the two major undergraduate schools: the Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts a ...
. It is the core of Johns Hopkins, offering comprehensive undergraduate education and graduate training in the humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences.
History
Johns Hopkins University, founded as the nation's first research university in 1876, originally hired "thirty of the profoundest scholars in the varied field of literature that can be secured, and which, with its magnificent endowment, will undoubtedly become one of the leading institutions of learning in America". The current School of Arts and Sciences was formed when the Faculty of Philosophy merged with the Faculty of Engineering in 1967–1968.
In December 1992,
Zanvyl Krieger
Zanvyl Krieger (April 1, 1906 – September 15, 2000) was an American businessman and philanthropist in Baltimore, Maryland. He was best known for his philanthropy, including major donations to the Johns Hopkins University and the Kennedy Kriege ...
, a 1928 alumnus, gave a $50 million challenge grant to the School of Arts and Sciences, "the largest monetary gift in the university's history and one of the largest in American higher education".
The school was renamed for Krieger, who said "he chose to give the gift to the arts and sciences school because that was an area that philanthropists had neglected in recent years".
In November 2001, the school established two scholarships to honor six alumni killed in the September 11 terrorist attacks.
In November 2013, the university released its draft "Strategic Planning Final Report for the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences".
Under the plan, fewer graduate students would be admitted (with enrollment cuts of 25% across departments), but graduate stipends were to be increased. In addition, more junior teaching faculty would replace retiring senior faculty.
Students objected in October 2016 when closure of the Humanities Center was under consideration. In January 2017, the school's dean assured them that the center would not close, but would be reorganized around one of three proposals: "...keeping the center’s name while rethinking its role in relation to other humanities departments; renaming the department as something that more 'clearly conveys its identity and focus'; or transforming the humanities center into a comparative literature department..."
October 2017 brought cancellation of the institution's Russian major, which was no longer compatible with the partner program in Russian at
Goucher College
Goucher College ( ') is a private liberal arts college in Towson, Maryland. It was chartered in 1885 by a conference in Baltimore led by namesake John F. Goucher and local leaders of the Methodist Episcopal Church.https://archive.org/details/h ...
. Russian courses continue to be taught, but a major in Russian is not available.
A university-wide promotion and tenure committee was established in 2020, to be piloted for three years and then evaluated.
Description
Krieger School's educational offerings include over 60 undergraduate majors and minors and over 40 full-time and part-time graduate programs. Summer programs are available to high school students, visiting undergraduate students, and a post-baccalaureate pre-medical program. Among these academic programs, the Krieger School's Biology, Creative Writing (Writing Seminars), Economics, English, German, History, History of Art, and Physics & Astronomy departments are among the top-ranked in the nation.
Faculty members are expected to spend as much time researching as teaching, and there are numerous research opportunities for both undergraduate and graduate students, ranging from the university-sponsored Woodrow Wilson Undergraduate Research Program to the nationwide Fulbright Hays Program for graduate students. Recent enrollment figures available number that the Krieger School has 2,790 undergraduate students, 32 post-baccalaureate students, 924 full-time graduate students, and 1,379 part-time graduate students.
Academics
Humanities
Courses are offered in
philosophy
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
, classical
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
and
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
, history of art, creative writing, comparative literature, Near Eastern studies, film and media studies, and history of science and technology, as well as in the more familiar areas of English and
American literature
American literature is literature written or produced in the United States of America and in the colonies that preceded it. The American literary tradition thus is part of the broader tradition of English-language literature, but also inc ...
, history, and modern foreign languages. In February 2018, investor and alumnus Bill Miller donated $75 million to the philosophy department, to be used to increase the department's faculty and expand undergraduate and graduate programs.
Natural sciences
The departments of
Biology
Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary i ...
,
Biophysics
Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from molecular to organismic and populations. ...
,
Chemistry
Chemistry is the science, scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the Chemical element, elements that make up matter to the chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions ...
,
Cognitive Science, Earth and Planetary Sciences,
Mathematics
Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...
, and
Physics
Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...
and
Astronomy
Astronomy () is a natural science that studies astronomical object, celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and chronology of the Universe, evolution. Objects of interest ...
offer programs leading to bachelor's degrees.
Social and behavioral sciences
There are a variety of programs available in
anthropology
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavi ...
,
economics
Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services.
Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...
,
geography
Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth description") is a field of science devoted to the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and ...
,
history
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...
,
political science
Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
,
psychology
Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries betwe ...
, and
sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...
. The departments are oriented toward research and the curricula are primarily designed to lead to graduate study.
Departments
The Krieger School contains many degree-granting departments, programs, and centers:
Notably, the French department was recognized as a "Center of Excellence" in the study of French culture and language by the government of France, one of only four in the United States. The Writing Seminars department, a program in creative writing, was ranked second-best in the nation by ''
U.S. News & World Report''.
Advanced academic programs
The Johns Hopkins University provides education in a part-time format through the Advanced Academic Programs (AAP). A division of the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and centered in Washington, DC,
AAP
Research centers
References
External links
Official website
{{authority control
Arts and Science
Educational institutions established in 1876
Liberal arts colleges at universities in the United States
1876 establishments in Maryland