University of Minnesota Crookston - History

History

In 1895, the Minnesota legislature appropriated $30,000 to construct experimental research farms at Morris and Crookston. The Great Northern Railway, under the guidance of James J. Hill, donated 476 acres (193 ha), and the Northwest Experiment Station was established.

In 1905, the Minnesota legislature appropriated $15,000 to establish the Northwest School of Agriculture (NWSA), a regional residential agricultural high school. The school provided training in "the technical and practical business of agriculture and in the art of homemaking." The school year began in October and ended in March to accommodate farm students. In 1906, the Northwest School of Agriculture officially opened.

In 1963, the University of Minnesota Bureau of Field Studies began examining the need for a two-year institution of higher education at the NWSA and, in the fall of 1966, the University of Minnesota Technical Institute, a two-year (associate) degree granting institution, opened its doors to the first incoming class of 187 students.

For two years the NWSA and the Technical Institute shared the campus. In the spring of 1968 a torch was passed—figuratively and literally—from the 60th and final graduating class of the NWSA to the first graduating class of the Technical Institute, now an official coordinate campus of the University of Minnesota. In all, 5,433 students completed their high school education at the NWSA. Later in 1968 the name of the campus was changed from the University of Minnesota Technical Institute to the University of Minnesota Technical College.

By 1977, the University of Minnesota Technical College had nearly 1,000 students taking classes in a range of degree options in the areas of agriculture; business; home and family services; and hotel, restaurant and institutional management. In 1988, the name was changed to the University of Minnesota, Crookston (UMC).

In 1993, the University of Minnesota, Crookston became a baccalaureate degree granting institution. That same year, the U of M, Crookston launched its "Laptop U" initiative, providing laptop computers to all students and faculty. It is widely recognized as the first college in the U.S. to have created a fully ubiquitous computing teaching and learning environment. Over the next few years, more than 100 colleges and universities from across the U.S. and Canada visited the campus to learn more about this innovation. Some of these adopted programs modeled closely after UMC’s.

External Link: A Brief History of the U of M, Crookston Campus