Kalamazoo College Informations

Kalamazoo College, also known as K College or simply K, is a private liberal arts college founded in 1833 in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The college campus is located immediately east of Western Michigan University. The school was founded by American Baptist ministers, but today it maintains no religious affiliation.

Kalamazoo College is a member of the Great Lakes Colleges Association. It is listed in Loren Pope's Colleges That Change Lives. In 2012, Forbes rated it 65th of America's Best Colleges, the highest ranked private college in Michigan. It was historically known as a leading producer of Peace Corps volunteers among small liberal arts colleges.

Kalamazoo College was founded in 1833 by a group of Baptist ministers as the Michigan and Huron Institute. Its charter was granted on April 22, 1833, the first school chartered by the Legislative Council of the Territory of Michigan. Instruction at the Institute began in fall 1836. In 1837, the name of the fledgling college was changed to the "Kalamazoo Literary Institute" and school officials made their first attempt to secure recognition as a college from the state of Michigan. In 1838, however, the University of Michigan opened the Kalamazoo Branch of the University of Michigan, providing a local competitor to the Literary Institute. In 1840, the two schools merged, and from 1840 to 1850 the College operated as the Kalamazoo Branch of the University of Michigan. In 1850, the Kalamazoo Literary Institute name was restored and in 1855 the school finally received an educational charter from the State of Michigan, establishing explicit recognition of the school as a college. After receiving its educational charter, the school changed its name to Kalamazoo College.

James Andrus Blinn Stone, the first president of Kalamazoo College, led the school from 1842 through 1863 and was responsible for instituting the high academic standards that allowed the college to receive its charter. Shortly after becoming president, Stone proposed the addition of a theological seminary to increase the supply of ministers in the region. With the support of the Baptist church, classes at the Kalamazoo Theological Seminary began in 1848 with 11 students. At the same time, the Female Department continued to expand under the watchful eye of Lucinda Hinsdale Stone. In 1845-46, almost half of the 90 students enrolled in Kalamazoo were women.

The Stones also played a role in the creation of the Republican Party. A meeting of disgruntled Michigan Whigs, Democrats, and abolitionists at the Stones' Kalamazoo residence set the date for an anti-slavery convention in Jackson, Michigan, which resulted in the formal birth of the Republican Party.

The first known student of African descent to attend Kalamazoo College was ex-slave Rufus Lewis Perry. Perry attended Kalamazoo Theological Seminary from 1860–1861, but left before he received a diploma. He was ordained a Baptist minister in Ann Arbor in 1861, and later earned a Ph.D. from State University in Louisville, Kentucky. Jamaican-born brothers Solomon and John Williamson were the first black graduates from "K," receiving their diplomas in 1911. Kalamazoo College also served as a pioneer in coed education, granting its first degree to a woman, Catherine V. Eldred, in 1870.

In 1877, Kalamazoo College students published the first edition of The Index, a student-run newspaper that continues to publish today. The college also publishes The Cauldron, an annual literary-arts journal, and The Passage, an annual compilation of students' work from study abroad.

Kalamazoo College's reputation as an academic powerhouse and a leader in international education was built during the presidency of Weimer Hicks, who served from 1954 to 1971. Hicks conceived of the "K Plan" program under which most Kalamazoo students spend at least one term abroad and spend at least one term working in an academic internship. As part of the original K Plan, Kalamazoo College students could attend school year-round. One typical pattern was:

Variations to this schedule — such as spring-term study-abroad programs, full-year study-abroad programs, and winter SIPs — were also common. However, the college scrapped its summer term in 1996 due to the difficulty of attracting students to a year-round college.

On January 3, 2006, Kalamazoo College opened the new Upjohn Library Commons which includes the completely renovated skeleton of the older library, and an extension which adds to its volume capacity.

Kalamazoo offers 30 majors spread across the fields of Fine Arts, Humanities, Modern and Classical Languages and Literature, Natural Sciences and Mathematics, and Social Sciences. Additionally, the college offers 22 minors, 5 special programs, and 13 concentrations. It is ranked number five in The Washington Post's Hidden Gems college list, as the best school in Michigan and 52nd best college in the nation by Forbes, 68th in US News and World Report's category of national liberal arts colleges, and is listed in Loren Pope's Colleges That Change Lives.

A 2017 study by Higher Education Data Sharing lists Kalamazoo College in the top 2 percent of four-year liberal arts colleges in the United States whose graduates go on to earn a Ph.D. According to this study, Kalamazoo College is ranked number seventeen among all private liberal arts colleges and — when compared with all academic institutions — it ranks number thirty-three in Ph.Ds per capita. Among all undergraduate institutions, Kalamazoo College was #1 per capita in 2005 for recruitment of Peace Corps volunteers.

96 percent of full-time faculty hold a Ph.D. or the terminal degree in their field.

Kalamazoo College emphasizes the importance of experiential education. The academic plan — known as the "K plan" — consists of a rigorous liberal arts education supplemented by experience abroad and in the Kalamazoo community.

Students at Kalamazoo College must fulfill specific degree requirements in order to graduate, as well as completion of three Shared Passages Seminars during the first, sophomore, and senior years at Kalamazoo. First-year seminars focus on developing writing and communication skills, sophomore seminars emphasize international culture and experience in preparation for study abroad, and senior seminars focus on major specific or interdisciplinary topics to cap a student's education experience. Upon graduation, students must demonstrate a proficiency in a second language at an intermediate level, satisfy a quantitative reasoning requirement, and complete a senior individualized project which may take the form of a thesis, an artistic performance, or any other work-intensive project of a student's choosing. These experiences are supplemented by one or more terms abroad, service-learning projects during school terms, and internship opportunities during the summer.

Kalamazoo College initiated the service-learning program in 1997. In 2001, Trustee Ronda Stryker dedicated to her grandmother the Mary Jane Underwood Stryker Institute for Service learning. This Institute was created to house several service-Learning programs in the school. The current director of the Mary Jane Underwood Stryker Institute is Alison Geist. In 2008, Kalamazoo College had twenty-three on-going service-learning programs. Several courses in the college incorporate service-learning into their curricula. Programs in service-learning include Community Advocates for Parents and Students, Helping Youth through Personal Empowerment, Academic Mentorship In Giants On-going Success, the Woodward School, Keeping the Doors Open, and Farms to K.

US News and World Report's America's Best Colleges 2003 ranked Kalamazoo College's study abroad program as number one in the country. About 70% of Kalamazoo College students spend at least one term abroad and the college maintains partnerships with over 45 programs and 22 countries on six continents. Students at Kalamazoo College typically study abroad during their third (Junior) Year, and each academic department designs its requirements in a way that assumes majors will study abroad for all or part of junior year. though some students may choose to do a short-term study abroad during their second (Sophomore) or fourth (Senior) year.

In 2009, the Center Career Development merged with the Guilds of Kalamazoo College to create the Center for Career and Professional Development. The CCPD's mission is to create meaningful connections to the world of work, empowering Kalamazoo College students to explore, identify and pursue their diverse interests, values and passions, and to develop a framework of skills, networks and knowledge for successful lifelong career planning and professional development. Unique opportunities through the CCPD include the Discovery Externship Program and the Field Experience Program

The college's sports teams are known as the Hornets. They compete in the NCAA's Division III and the Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MIAA). As of 2016, the Hornet Men's tennis squad has won its conference's championship 78 consecutive years. Kalamazoo College competes in the following sports:

College football has been played at Kalamazoo since 1892, when the school completed a record of 0 wins and 2 losses, both to Olivet College. The school's first win came two years later in 1894 with a 16–4 victory over the Kalamazoo YMCA. It was 1895 before the school defeated another college football team, with a 12–8 victory over Alma.

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