History and traditions

A tradition of breaking with tradition

Since 1890, UChicago has followed a distinctively different path. Our founders defined what they believed would build an enduring legacy: a commitment to rigorous academics for people of all backgrounds.

Unbound by convention


Since its inception, the University has blurred the lines between traditional disciplines. Students, faculty, and scholars collaborate across fields to solve complex questions and uncover new knowledge.

Distinctive Core curriculum

Through sequences in the humanities, social sciences, and physical and biological sciences, as well as the historical development of civilizations, our students engage with the language, questions, and methods that characterize broad fields of inquiry.

This university fosters a distinctive culture. Built upon the principles of academic freedom and free expression, it is suffused by a genuine love for ideas and a conviction in the power knowledge holds to shape society for the better.

—President Paul Alivisatos

In a 1902 lecture, founding president William Rainey Harper reminded his audience that “complete freedom of speech on all subjects has from the beginning been regarded as fundamental.”

The 217-acre Hyde Park campus is a designated botanic garden.

Often described as an oasis in the city of Chicago, the original campus was designed as an interconnected academic village linked by quadrangles.

The core campus was modeled after the English Gothic architectural style used at Oxford, complete with towers, spires, cloisters, elaborate ironwork, and grotesques.

Physicist Albert A. Michelson became the first American and first UChicago scholar to win a Nobel Prize in the sciences in 1907.

DEEPER MEANINGS

UNIVERSITY TRADITIONS

Over history, the University has developed time-honored traditions and customs that are unique to UChicago.

Aims of Education Address

Convocation

Harper Lectures

Latke-Hamantash Debate

Ryerson Lecture

Scav Hunt