Tufts University

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Tufts redirects here. For people named Tufts, see Tufts (surname).

Tufts University
Motto	Pax et Lux (Peace and Light)
Established	1852
Type	Private
Endowment	$1.2 billion USD[1]
President	Lawrence S. Bacow
Provost	Jamshed Bharucha
Faculty	583
Undergraduates	4,900
Postgraduates	4,300
Location	Medford/Somerville, MA, USA
Campus	Urban/Suburban
Colors	Brown and blue
Mascot	Jumbo
Affiliations	NESCAC
Website	www.tufts.edu

Tufts University is a private university in Medford/Somerville, Massachusetts, suburbs of Boston. The school emphasizes public service in all disciplines^[2] and is well-known for internationalism and its study abroad programs.^[3] The university is home to the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.

In 1852, Charles Tufts founded Tufts College and donated the land for the campus on Walnut Hill, the highest point in Medford. Tufts said that he wanted to set a "light on the hill." Originally affiliated with the Universalist Church, Tufts is now non-sectarian. The name was changed to "Tufts University" in 1954, although the corporate name remains "the Trustees of Tufts College."

In the late 1970s, the French-American nutritionist Jean Mayer became president of Tufts and, through a series of rapid acquisitions, transformed the school from a small liberal arts college into an international research university.^[4]

Contents 1 Institution 1.1 Admissions 1.2 Organization 2 Campuses 2.1 Greater Boston 2.2 Satellite facilities 3 Culture and student life 3.1 Traditions 3.2 Athletics 3.3 Campus media and publications 3.4 A cappella groups 4 History 4.1 Recent developments 5 Notable alumni and staff 6 Tufts in popular culture 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Institution

Tufts employs 3,500 people with 8,500 students from across the United States and more than 100 countries attending classes on the university's three campuses in Massachusetts (Boston, Medford/Somerville and Grafton) and one in Talloires, France. In addition, the university is affiliated with the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the New England Conservatory of Music.

Tufts is ranked 27 in the "National Universities" category of the America's Best Colleges 2007 list by U.S. News & World Report. The institution is also categorized as a "Doctoral/Research Extensive" institution by the Carnegie Foundation. Media outlets have referred to Tufts as a "Little Ivy" or one of the "New Ivies."^[5] In the Princeton Review's 2007 Best 361 Colleges, Tufts was named #7 in a list of the 20 schools in the country where students are happiest.

[edit] Admissions

Admission to Tufts University is highly competitive and extremely selective;^[6] in 2006, the university accepted 27% of 15,294 applications to its undergraduate class of 2010.^[7]

In selecting the class of 2011, Dean of Arts and Sciences Robert Sternberg added experimental criteria to the application process for undergraduates to test "creativity and other non-academic factors." Calling it the "first major university to try such a departure from the norm," Inside Higher Ed notes that Tufts continues to consider the SAT and other traditional criteria.^[8][9]

[edit] Organization

Tufts comprises eight schools, including:

• The School of Arts and Sciences (1898 or 1903) and the School of Engineering (1898), the only divisions of the university that award both undergraduate and graduate degrees, form the Faculty of Arts, Sciences, and Engineering.
• The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (1933), America's oldest graduate school for international relations and foreign affairs.
• The School of Dental Medicine (1899)
• The School of Medicine (1893) and Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences (1981), with affiliated hospitals New England Medical Center and Bay State Hospital.
• The Gerald J. and Dorothy R. Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy (1981), with the USDA Human Nutrition Research Center.
• The Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine (1978), the only veterinary school in New England.

The Jackson College for Women, established in 1910 as a coordinate college adjacent to the Tufts campus, was integrated with Tufts College in 1980, but is recognized in the name of the undergraduate arts and sciences division, the "College of Liberal Arts and Jackson College". The campus land that was Jackson College is in the city of Somerville. Women continued to receive their diplomas from Jackson College until 2002.

The Experimental College, often called the "Ex College", was created on the Medford campus in 1964 as a proving ground for "innovative", experimental, and interdisciplinary curricula and courses. The college is governed by a board of five students and five faculty members who set policy and select courses. By far, the most prominent feature of the Experimental College is EPIIC, a year-long program through the Institute for Global Leadership at Tufts University begun in 1985 to immerse students in a global issue, culminating in an annual symposium of scholars and experts from the field.

The Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service was founded in 2000 "to educate for active citizenship" with the help of a $10 million gift from eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife Pam. In 2006 the school was renamed after a $40 million dollar gift from Jonathan Tisch. The Tisch College has been called the "most ambitious attempt by any research university to make public service part of its core academic mission."^[10]

[edit] Campuses

[edit] Greater Boston

• The Medford/Somerville campus on Walnut Hill houses the undergraduate campus and university administration. Administrative offices of the university are centered on Ballou Hall, the oldest building on the hill, and extend into the surrounding neighborhoods and Davis Square. The Fletcher School is also located on the Medford campus. The hill is often cited for having two of the three best views of the city skyline in the greater Boston area.^{[citation needed]}

• The medical school is located on a campus in Boston adjacent to Tufts-New England Medical Center (Tufts-NEMC), a 451-bed academic medical institution. All full time Tufts-NEMC physicians hold faculty appointments at Tufts.

• The veterinary school is located in Grafton, Massachusetts, west of Boston on a 634-acre campus. The school also maintains the Ambulatory Farm Clinic in Woodstock, Connecticut and the Tufts Laboratory at the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole on Cape Cod.

[edit] Satellite facilities

• Tufts has a satellite campus in Talloires, France at the Tufts European Center, a former Benedictine priory built in the 11th century. The priory was purchased in 1958 by Donald MacJannet and his wife Charlotte and used as a summer camp site for several years before the MacJannets gave the campus to Tufts in 1978. Each year the center hosts a number of summer study programs, and enrolled students live with local families. The site is frequently the host of international conferences and summits.

[edit] Culture and student life

A fixture on the Medford campus is a replica of a cannon taken from the deck of the USS Constitution, donated to the university by the city of Medford in 1956.^[11] Since 1977, it has been used by student groups and individual students who paint advertisements, political statements, birthday greetings, and other messages on the cannon under the cover of night. Painting the cannon is a competitive activity; students must guard their handiwork or risk of having their message painted over by a rival group before dawn.^[12]

The Tufts school mascot is Jumbo the elephant, in honor of a major donation from circus owner P.T. Barnum in 1882. While Barnum gave the skeleton of the animal to the American Museum of Natural History, the stuffed remains of Jumbo were put on display in the basement of Barnum Hall until the building burned down in 1974. The alleged ashes of Jumbo currently reside in a peanut butter jar in the athletic director's office. A large plaster-statue elephant, Jumbo II, now sits on the academic quad.

The Leonard Carmichael Society is the largest student group at Tufts, an umbrella organization for community and public service projects. LCS is comprised of a volunteer corps of over 1,000 and a staff of eighty-five.

[edit] Traditions

• The Naked Quad Run takes place just before fall finals, where several thousand students unwind by stripping and running circuit around the Rez Quad. Most students run naked, while many wear body paint or costumes.
• A concert known as Spring Fling takes place in the spring semester immediately before final exams on the President's Lawn; acts over the past several years have included The Roots, Less than Jake, and Tufts alumni Guster.
• The night before Spring Fling, the Tuftonia's Day fireworks take place on the Rez Quad.
• The Tufts Mountain Club famously "pumpkins" the campus on the night before Halloween, placing pumpkins in prominent and increasingly absurd locations such as atop buildings and statues. Students and faculty awake to the unique decor the next morning. Although the ritual is over 75 years old, the TMC has never officially taken credit for it.

[edit] Athletics

Tufts is a member of the Division III National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC), which includes Amherst, Bates, Bowdoin, Colby, Connecticut College, Hamilton, Middlebury, Trinity, Williams, and Wesleyan. Tufts distinguishes itself from other Division III schools by competing against nearby Division I schools such Boston College, Dartmouth, and Harvard. Tufts, like other Division III schools, does not offer athletic scholarships. Men's and women's squash and coed and women's sailing are the only Division I sports at the school.

The Tufts football program is one of the oldest in the country. The 1,000th game in team history was played during the 2006 season. Historians point [2] to a Tufts versus Harvard game in 1875 as the first between two American colleges using American football rules. Discussion of the historic game and its place in the evolution of football was featured in the Boston Globe and on ESPN.

[edit] Campus media and publications

• The Tufts Daily, the daily student newspaper and the most prominent source of news for the last two decades; the Daily is notable for its financial independence, receiving no funding from the student activities fee.
• The Tufts Observer, a weekly newsmagazine and the oldest student organization on campus, having been founded in 1895 as the university's first student newspaper.
• The The Primary Source, a journal of conservative thought.
• The Zamboni, a humor and satire magazine.
• The Tufts Traveler, a travel journal founded in 2005.
• WMFO (91.5 FM Medford) is freeform radio operated by students and community volunteers since 1970; the station broadcasts 365 days a year and operates out of Curtis Hall.
• TUTV, the campus television station, operated by Tufts students in partnership with the Ex College.
• JumboCast, a student-run broadcast group that specializes in streaming Tufts events live over the internet via webcast.
• Hemispheres, since 1976 one of the few undergraduate journals dedicated to international relations in the United States.
• The Public Journal, an alternative literary magazine, founded in 2005, which focuses on publishing found literature.
• Outbreath, a literary magazine which publishes short, fictional stories, photography, and one-act plays.

[edit] A cappella groups

Tufts notably has a competitive a cappella scene, being home to numerous a cappella groups that (somewhat humorously) each lay claim to a particular niche of the school's culture.

[edit] History

Charles Tufts was the donor of the land the university now occupies on the Medford-Somerville line. The twenty-acre plot, given to the Universalist church on the condition that it be used for a college, was valued at $20,000 and located on one of the highest hills in the Boston area, Walnut Hill. In 1852, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts chartered Tufts College. Having been one of the biggest influences in the establishment of the College, Hosea Ballou II became the first president in 1853.

P.T. Barnum was one of the earliest benefactors of Tufts College, and the Barnum Museum of Natural History was constructed in 1884 with funds donated by him. On April 14, 1975, fire gutted Barnum Hall; the collection housed in the building was completely lost, including numerous animal specimens, Barnum's desk and bust, and the stuffed hide of Jumbo the elephant.

On July 15, 1892, the Board of Trustees voted to admit women to Tufts College.[3]

The university remained in relative obscurity until the presidency of Jean Mayer (1976–1992). Mayer was, by all accounts, some combination of "charming, witty, duplicitous, ambitious, brilliant, intellectual, opportunistic, generous, vain, slippery, loyal, possessed of an inner standard of excellence, and charismatic".^[13] Mayer established Tufts' veterinary, nutrition, and biomedical schools and acquired the Grafton and Talloires campuses, at the same time lifting the university out of its crippling financial situation.

[edit] Recent developments

Financially, the university has received the three largest donations in its history during 2005 and 2006. On 4 November 2005, eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife Pam donated $100 million to Tufts to establish the Omidyar-Tufts Microfinance Fund.^[14] On 12 May 2006, Jonathan Tisch gave $40 million to endow the University College of Citizenship and Public Service, which now bears his name.^[15] The veterinary school was named in honor of William S. Cummings after a $50 million donation to the school in 2005.

On 3 November 2006, Tufts officially launched a capital campaign entitled Beyond Boundaries with the intent of raising $1.2 billion and fully implementing need-blind admission.^[16]

On 12 December 2006, it was reported nationally (via the Associated Press) that a controversy had erupted on the Tufts undergraduate campus regarding a rewritten Christmas carol in the conservative undergraduate publication The Primary Source, which was intended as a satire of affirmative action and which was considered racist by many in the community. The administration denounced the carol, but insisted it would not censor the magazine.^[17][18]

In August 2006, Tufts subsidy TUDC LLC and development partner Hines Interests LP secured approval to build a 621-foot tower atop Boston's South Station. The complex, designed by César Pelli, was conceived by Jean Mayer in 1991 as a medical research hub. Construction is expected to begin in late 2007 and is an example of transit-oriented development.^[19][20]

[edit] Notable alumni and staff

Main article: List of Tufts University people

[edit] Tufts in popular culture

• Hannah, the heroine in Curtis Sittenfeld's second novel, The Man of My Dreams, goes to Tufts. Interestingly, the heroine in Sittenfeld's first novel, Prep, was rejected from Tufts.
• Pete and Berg, the lead characters in the sitcom Two Guys and a Girl met as undergraduates at Tufts.
• The gate to the President's Lawn was featured in the opening credits of the sitcom Sabrina the Teenage Witch.
• Elaine Benes, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus in the sitcom Seinfeld, mentions that she attended Tufts, and that it was her "safety school".
• Large portions of Tufts' Alum and bestselling author Darin Strauss's forthcoming novel, More Than It Hurts You, take place at the University.
• Scott Adler, recurring character in Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan series. Eventual U.S. Secretary of State, Adler graduated first in his class at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.
• Dr. Jordan Cavanaugh, title character from Crossing Jordan, played by Jill Hennessy. The fictional Boston medical examiner graduated from Tufts' medical school.
• Amy Abbott on the WB drama Everwood was rejected from Tufts in an episode of the show.
• Ken Erdedy, character in the novel Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. It is likely that the fictional marijuana addict and resident of Ennet House attended Tufts University, evidenced among other things by the memorabilia in his household (p.25, 360, 362).
• Dr. Jennifer Melfi, psychiatrist to Tony Soprano on The Sopranos graduated from Tufts Medical School.
• Julie Merkel, a cutthroat prep school student in the film Cheats, a 2002 comedy starring Mary Tyler Moore, wants desperately to attend Tufts.
• Kenny, a Stuckeybowl employee on the TV show Ed, graduated from Tufts (and, when asked about it by Ed, replied, "It's in Massachusetts").
• Jenna Blake in the Body of Evidence mystery novels attends Somerset University, a fictional version of the Tufts campus.
• Susan Silverman of Robert B. Parker's Spenser mystery series teaches at "Taft University," a thinly-veiled stand-in for Tufts, and Parker uses the Taft setting in several books.
• Toyota ran an ad in the late 1970s/early 1980s that portrayed a student setting off for college in his new Toyota and driving cross-country from his home in southern California. The ad finished with his triumphant arrival in front of Eaton Hall. For years, this commercial was shown before all campus movies.
• Some outdoor footage of the Tufts campus was shot in fall of 1967 for the 1968 movie Charly starring Cliff Robertson and Claire Bloom. The movie is based on the short story "Flowers for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes and is about a slow man made into a genius — temporarily.
• The indoor shots of the prom scene in the movie The Next Karate Kid were filmed in the Cousen's Gymnasium at Tufts.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Tufts University (official website)
• TuftsLife.com (student life portal)

Presidents of Tufts University

Reverend Hosea Ballou II (1853–1861) • Reverend Alonzo Ames Miner (1862–1875) • Reverend Elmer Hewitt Capen (1875–1905) • Reverend Frederick W. Hamilton (1905–1912) • William Leslie Hooper (Acting President) (1912–1914) • Hermon Carey Bumpus (1914–1919) • John Albert Cousens (1919–1937) • Leonard Carmichael (1938–1952) • Nils Vngve Wessell (1953–1966) • Burton Crosby Hallowell (1967–1976) • Jean Mayer (1976–1992) • John DiBiaggio (1992–2001) • Lawrence S. Bacow (2001–)

Colleges and universities in metropolitan Boston v • d • e

Art Institute of Boston • Babson • Bentley • Berklee College of Music • Boston Architectural College • Boston College • Boston Conservatory • Boston University • Brandeis • Cambridge College • Curry • Eastern Nazarene • Emerson • Emmanuel • Fisher College • Harvard • Hellenic • Lasell • Lesley • MassBay • MassArt • Mass. College of Pharmacy • MIT • Mount Ida • New England Conservatory • New England School of Law • Northeastern • Olin • Pine Manor • Regis • School of the MFA • Simmons • Stonehill • Suffolk • Tufts • UMass Boston • Wellesley • Wentworth • Wheelock

New England Small College Athletic Conference
Amherst • Bates • Bowdoin • Colby • Connecticut College • Hamilton • Middlebury • Trinity • Tufts • Wesleyan • Williams

National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association
Army • City • Cornell • Drew • Fairleigh Dickinson • Florida • Haverford • Hunter CUNY • Johns Hopkins • Marist • Maryland College Park • New Jersey Institute of Technology • Queens CUNY • Smith • Stevens Institute of Technology • Temple • Tufts • Virginia • Virginia Tech • Yeshiva