University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus Informations

The University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus (Spanish: Universidad de Puerto Rico, Recinto de Río Piedras, La IUPI, UPR-RP, UPRRP), is a public research university[failed verification] located on a 289-acre (1.17 km2) campus in Río Piedras, San Juan, Puerto Rico. It is the largest of the eleven campuses of the University of Puerto Rico System in terms of student population, and it is Puerto Rico's first public university campus.

The university serves more than 18,000 students, of which 20% are graduate students, and grants an average of over 3,000 degrees a year. Its academic offerings range from the bachelor to the doctoral degree, through 70 undergraduate programs and 19 graduate degrees with 71 specializations in the basic disciplines and professional fields. UPR‐RP has consistently granted the largest number of doctorate degrees to Hispanics under the American flag.

In the year 1900 the Escuela Normal Industrial (Normal Industrial School) was established in Fajardo, Puerto Rico as the first institution of higher education in Puerto Rico dedicated to those who would become teachers on the island. At the time it only had 20 students and 5 professors.

A year later, in 1901, it was moved to the town of Río Piedras, because the roads to Fajardo were in a terrible condition. In the mild and studying-favourable nature around what was known by the time as "La Convalecencia" (the summer residence of the Spanish Governors of Puerto Rico) was placed, temporally, the Normal School. Its objectives were still the formation of new teachers for the island.

On March 12, 1903, under the administration of the Public Instruction Commissioner, Samuel McCune Lindsay, the 2nd Legislative Assembly approved a law creating the University of Puerto Rico in Río Piedras, transferring all the funding of the Insular Normal School there. This School became the first department of the university, what is now the Faculty of Education, becoming the nucleus of the University of Puerto Rico.

Now legally established, the University of Puerto Rico started its first academic year (1903–1904) with an enrollment of 173 students. Due to the scarcity of teachers in the island, most of these students were appointed by the Department of Public Instruction to teach at schools without having finished four years of college. The first graduating class (June 1907) consisted of 13 students.

In 1907, the first class graduated from the normal course of four years after the university was legally established. Among the students in that class were Carlota Matienzo, Isabel Andréu, Loaíza Cordero, Marina Roviro, and Juan Herrero.

On September 22, 1913, the departments of Law and Pharmacology were established. The university at the time required only an 8th grade diploma, but with the expansion of its courses, this requirement changed. After 1917, the departments of Normal Education, Liberal Arts, Pharmacology, and Law required a high school diploma for admission.

On February 21, 1931, Dr. Carlos E. Chardón was appointed as chancellor of the university. During his tenure the university experienced significant growth in endowments. These were used in the expansion of the physical facilities at the Río Piedras and Mayagüez Campuses. This helped turn the university into a respected educational center. Chardón resigned from the post of Chancellor in 1936, being succeeded by Juan B. Soto. The most important part of this period was the expansion of the buildings of the University as part of a plan for the rehabilitation of Puerto Rico.

In 1936, architect Rafael Carmoega, working under the Puerto Rico Reconstruction Administration (PRRA), designed the distinctive University of Puerto Rico clock tower based on the 1924 Parsons Plan. The iconic university clock tower was built in 1937 and christened as the Franklin Delano Roosevelt tower, in honor of that U.S. president and his interest in the building of the university. La Torre (as The Tower is nicknamed in Spanish) is located at the entrance of the Román Baldorioty de Castro Building. Also at the entrance of the Tower, the coats of arms of the nations of the Americas appear in a bronze circle, as a symbol of Panamerican Union.

The University was the site of social upheaval during the 1960s and 1970s, when nationalist students protested for civil rights, the independence of Puerto Rico, and taking the ROTC out of the campus. In 1970 Antonia Martínez was murdered by the police when they repressed students. As the shouting started in the street, everyone in the building she was in, on Ponce de León Avenue, went to the balconies to see what was happening. She was, like many others, watching the events, saw policemen attacking at the students, and allegedly shouted at the police ¡Asesinos! (Assassins!). A policeman turned and shot her in the head, killing her and injuring a roommate. A mural of her and her story existed on the College of Humanities, until administrative personnel covered it with paint. Other stories claim that she was shot by mistake. The students of the University also had a strike in the Spring of 2017 during which the school was shut down for several days.

The Rio Piedras Campus is a collegiate university. The Chancellor of the Campus is the top academic and administrative officer and presides over its two deliberative bodies: the Administrative Board and the Academic Senate.

The Administrative Board, composed of the deans, two senators representing the faculty, and one student senator, advises the Chancellor in matters pertaining to the university program. The Board makes recommendations on leaves and faculty aid applications, and grants promotions and tenures.

The Academic Senate, in turn, is the official academic forum. It is composed of the deans, the director of the library system, elected faculty representatives from all the colleges and schools, student senators, and representatives from the staff of academic advisors. Its members participate on the institutional processes, establishing academic rules and collaborating with other organisms of the University of Puerto Rico system.

The General Student Council (Consejo General de Estudiantes or CGE in Spanish) of the UPRRP is the elected student government of the campus. The Council is composed of several representatives to the student council, elected by each School or College, the number of representatives varies depending on the number of students enrolled in the School or College, and the President and Senator of each School and College, for a total of around 50 members. Elections are held in April and representatives are elected for one year, from July 1 to June 30.

Having its origins in the 1920s, the Student Council was dissolved in 1948 while Jaime Benitez was chancellor, and under the council presidency of Juan Mari Brás and it was not until 1968 that the Student Council was re-installed under the name General Student Council and under the council presidency of David Noriega.

The General Student Council is governed by the Board of Directors, which is elected from among the council's members and is composed of:

Additionally, they select Representatives to the Campus' Administrative Board and the University's University Board, both of them with an Alternate Representative. They are members of the Board of Directors.

Every College and School has a student council of its own, composed by a President, Vice President, Executive Secretary, Treasurer, Records Clerk, Public Relations Chair, the College or School's Student Senator (and, if available for the College/School, an alternate senator), Representatives to the General Student Council (numbers vary from 1 up to 5, depending on the School or college's student population), and representatives of each department or subdivision present in the School or College.

The University High School, technically a part of the campus and its School of Education, has a Student Council independent of the campus student council system. It represents several hundred junior and senior high school students.

Complete article available at this page.