University+of+Wyoming+Histories

toc
 * University of Wyoming Histories **


 * Overview of the University of Wyoming**
 * From Blue Book Volume IV, 1990**

The history of the University of Wyoming since the early 1970s reflects, like many other state institutions, the history of the state.

During the 1970s, when many other institutions across the nation were dealing with dealing with diminishing resources, the University of Wyoming was achieving unparalleled growth. During this period the university changed from an institution primarily devoted to undergraduate education to one offering a wide variety of graduate programs and extensive research opportunities for faculty and students. Some view that change as having been detrimental to the quality of undergraduate learning; others see it as a step in the development of the university which helps place it on even ground with other significant universities around the nation.

These changes resulted in the development of 18 new master's degree programs, six new doctoral programs, and 19 new under­ graduate programs. The new graduate programs contributed to a growth in graduate student enrollments from 1,100 in 1970 to 1,500 in 1980. The number of students receiving graduate degrees, however, did not increase. There was a 25 percent increase in sponsored research at UW from 1975 to 1979.

The 1970s were also a time when the University of Wyoming came under increasing pressure to extended its programs and services throughout the state. From what had been a self-contained campus operation in 1969, the university grew to be a multi-site, multi-service institution extending throughout the state by 1979. The change in the university's focus was reflected in a change in the university's seal: in 1979 trustees voted to revise the seal to exclude the designation of Laramie on the seal and to replace it with the designation of the founding date of the university.

The need for better health services across Wyoming led the uni­versity to expand offerings for nursing students, and also develop further its programs in Pharmacy, Medical Technology, Dental Hygiene, and Speech Pathology and Audiology. One of the major issues confronting the university was a proposal to create a medical school with a family practice orientation. In 1976, with funds from the Governor's office, the College of Human Medicine was established to deal with what was perceived as a shortage of physicians in Wyoming. Debate over the concept of a medical school raged throughout the state from 1976 to 1978. And finally, a proposal for the establishment of a four-year medical school was defeated in the 1978 legislative session. However, family practice residency programs were approved and established at Casper and Cheyenne.

The face of the University of Wyoming campus also changed dramatically during the 1970s. During that time nearly 1.5 million square feet of new or renovated space was completed. And in 1979, the state legislature approved a $26.6 million appropriation as the first phase of a long-range plan to meet other university building needs.

All of these changes came with a price, and that price often was named conflict. No department in the university escaped the pressures of change. Administrative turnover followed. The conflicts and tensions extended well beyond the Laramie campus and altered relationships between the university and the state. The tension between the university and the state that came with the growth of the 1970s extended into the 1980s when state financial resources were drastically reduced.

Although legislators continued to express a desire to provide adequate funding for the state's single four-year institution of higher learning, differences developed over the definition of what was ad­ equate. Rivalry developed between the university and the state's com­ munity colleges for limited funds available to education. While some argued that the University of Wyoming deserved special consideration, others expected the university to adapt with the state's other institutions to the changing economic realities of the life in Wyoming.

In spite of those challenges, the university experienced growth and continued its efforts to meet the needs and expectations of its constituents. In 1976 the university had established a center in Casper to provide degree opportunities for residents of central Wyoming that had not previously existed. By 1987 over 350 students had received degrees through UW/Casper. Then, in 1987, the University of Wyo­ming and Casper College combined their resources to establish upper division and graduate instruction in a variety of liberal arts and pro­fessional programs.

Efforts to better serve the needs of students in an era of diminishing resources brought about significant changes in the administrative alignment of several departments and colleges within the university. Those changes affected health-related programs, geography and parks and recreation programs, agriculture and education. The plentiful resources of the late 1970s and early '80s had an impact that reached well into the decade. An agriculture building addition was completed in 1982, followed by completion of the Red Buttes Environmental Biology Laboratory, the engineering building addition, and the Veterinary Diagnostic and Research building. The last building, completed in 1987, was the Animal Science and Bio­ chemistry Building. Declining resources curtailed building late in the decade, but efforts continued for the construction of a new geology building and the American Heritage Center and Art Museum.

Conflicts over limited resources inevitably continued some of the tensions that became obvious in the late 1970s. The concerns of people inside the university and across the state were reflected in a major planning effort which resulted in the 1988 release of a document entitled Agenda: 2000. The document was called a strategic plan to move the University of Wyoming into the next century. And while the university moved aggressively to implement changes and improvements associated with the plan, legislators questioned-with increasing fre­ quency-the allocation of resources within the university. Responding to those questions in early 1990, the University of Wyoming Board of Trustees announced a comprehensive plan to evaluate all UW pro­ grams and operations and indicated a willingness to use the results of that evaluation to institute a major restructuring of the university and its programs.


 * The University of Wyoming**
 * By Wilson O. Clough, Professor Emeritus **
 * From Blue Book Volume III, 1974**

The University of Wyoming is at once a land-grant college and a state university. Taking advantage of the Ohio Act of 1787 and the Morrill Act of 1862, territorial Wyoming in 1886 moved to acquire the federal lands to be set aside for the encouragement of higher education in agricultural and mechanical arts. Only ten years had passed since Custer's last stand. The territory had less than 50,000 people and but four high schools. Nevertheless, on September 6, 1887, the school opened its one building with five professors and some forty-two students, most of them on the secondary level. The State Constitution of 1890 made further provisions for a state university, to admit men and women, without regard to creed or color, to the advantages of higher education.

The first twenty-five years were precarious ones, limited in support and slow in growth, despite a good staff. Up to World War I, some six buildings comprised the campus, one of them a dormitory. Only after that war did discovery of oil on university lands, and especially the 1923 legislative action to grant the university a precentage of the state's oil royalties, permit the first real expansion of the physical plant. Between 1922 and 1941, A. G. Crane's administration, such buildings were added as the library (now Aven Nelson Building), gymnasium and armory, engineering building, liberal arts building with a much-needed auditorium, and the Wyoming Union. Thus, on the 50th anniversary in 1937, the university faced the future with renewed confidence. Just before World War II, enrollments reached the 2,000 mark, with a graduating class of 350, a figure not again reached until 1947.

The return of World War II veterans doubled that enrollment, to be followed by some falling off between 1950 and 1962. Then came the growth that overtook the schools of the nation. By 1971, Wyoming's university had reached its high figure of 8,546 students on campus, including some 1,500 graduate students. They came from all the states and some forty-seven foreign countries. The Butler huts of war days gave way to six modern residence halls, plus 468 furnished apartments for married students. Today's physical plant counts some 200 buildings, and the campus has expanded from the initial twenty-one to 791 acres, plus four farms near Laramie of 2,700 acres, and state agricultural experiment stations and farms of an equal acreage.

The modern university will compare favorably with the best western state universities; yet at this writing (1974), it is still the state's sole four-year college and graduate school, serving half the freshmen and sophomores of the state, and all the upperclassmen and graduate students. Its library contains nearly a half million volumes, plus government bulletins, micro-reproductions, and around 5,300 periodicals. The faculty hold degrees from over the nation and from foreign lands, and graduates have achieved enviable records. Both graduates and faculty have been involved in foreign enterprises.

Seven accredited colleges, with numerous subdivisions, offer a varied curriculum, designed to meet ever-increasing and differentiated demands. They are as follows:
 * The College of Agriculture. Courses range from vocational agriculture to farm and ranch management, from animal husbandry to wool and agricultural economics, from state experiment farms to extension. Students have made excellent records in national competitive stock showings.
 * The College of Arts and Sciences. Oldest of curricula, this college has served from a third to a half of all students, and has supplied two-thirds of all class-hours of instruction. Its offerings touch the familiar fields of the arts and sciences: anthropology, biology, botany, chemistry and physics, geology, mathematics, English and languages, journalism, history, the social sciences, psychology and philosophy, zoology, and more. Experimental courses and an honors program attempt to meet contemporary demands. The Master's Degree is available in practically all fields, and the doctorate may be pursued in chemistry, geology, history, mathematics, physics, psychology, and zoology. Within the college will be found also the divisions of American Studies, music, and the plastic and theatre arts.
 * The College of Commerce and Industry. Courses range from accounting and business administration to economics and statistics. Foreign students are attracted to business and management, infrequently offered abroad. Typing and shorthand are now within the College of Education.
 * The College of Education. Its work is directed chiefly at teacher training in elementary and secondary education, and in meeting state requirements for certification. Programs are also offered toward master's and doctoral degrees. Within this college are adult, vocational, physical, and business education. Students in training may major in any campus college program toward specialized teaching.
 * The College of Engineering.Work is offered in the areas of civil, electrical, mechanical, and mineral, as well as architectural and agricultural engineering.
 * The College of Law. Fully accredited, this college prepares for admission to the Bar in any state. Special emphasis is placed on Western law, water rights, natural resources, as well as government and corporation law.
 * The College of Health Sciences. Here are the School of Nursing and the School of Pharmacy. The latter five-year program entitles graduates to state examinations for professional status in nearly all states. Medical technology and pre-medical and pre-dentistry work prepare students for admission to major medical schools over the country. Also available is a speech pathology program.

As a land-grant college, the university offers military science and aerospace studies, with both army and air Reserve Officers Training Corps. Such a range of offerings has necessitated a considerable expansion of the physical plant, and today's campus attracts comment for its unity in the use of native stone and space. Buildings too many to list have arisen since 1950. Among them are a Natural Resources Research Institute, the Educational Building, the Agricultural Building, the Fieldhouse and Stadium, the Law Building, the commerce Building, and the much appreciated W. R. Coe Library, housing the American Studies wing and the Archives which contains many valuable manuscripts pertaining to Western History.

the science centers with laboratories, libraries, classrooms, planetarium and computer centers, and a special circular classroom building with murals created by the school's Art Department. Latest of new additions is the Fine Arts structure, housing the divisions of music, speech and theatre, and the plastic arts. A music concert hall boasts a great tracker pipe organ brought from West Germany, the largest west of the Mississippi. The theatre also has an auditorium and artists studios.

The university is governed by a Board of Trustees, increased in 1890 from seven to nine, and in 1951 to twelve, for better state representation. Ex officio members are the president of the university, the Governor, the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, and, among the first in the nation, the student-body president. Board members are appointed for a six-year term by the Governor with senate approval, with no more than seven from any one party, and with county distribution.

A university's reputation rests finally less on buildings and plant than on library, laboratories, faculty, and students. Throughout the school's history, presidents have labored uniformly for state support, for quality, and for growth. The two longest administrations, those of Dr. Crane and Dr. Humphrey, were fortunate in opportunities for both in buildings, but all have endeavored to carry forward long-range plans and hopes for the future. The present incumbent, Dr. William D. Carlson, has noted that Wyoming's university encompasses what is met in Colorado by three state universities, not to mention other state and private schools. The university's mission, as always, remains that of the preservation of the best learning of the past, the instruction of youth in the present, and the contribution to future learning and wisdom. Without these, any state or nation languishes in the public skills and arts.


 * The University of Wyoming**
 * From Blue Book Volume II, 1943**

The Ninth Territorial Legislative Assembly, 1886, provided for the building of the University of Wyoming to be located at Laramie City, Wyoming; the government of the University was vested in a Board of Trustees, three of whom at all times to be residents of Laramie City; the trustees were appointed by the governor, with the consent of the legislative council for a term of four years each; the Board of Trustees was empowered to elect a president for the University, such professors, tutors, and other officers of the faculty as they deemed necessary, all to serve during the pleasure of the Board of Trustees.

By an Act of Congress, of February 28, 1881, "An Act to grant lands to Dakota, Montana, Arizona, Idaho, and Wyoming for university purposes," the University of Wyoming is a land grant university.

The Constitution provides for the establishment of the University of the State of Wyoming to be equally open to both sexes, irrespective of race or color; the State legislature to provide by law for the management of the University, its lands, and other properties, by a Board of Trustees, composed of seven members, appointed by the governor, with the consent of the senate, the powers and duties of the board to be prescribed by law; the president of the University and the superintendent of public instruction to be ex-officio members.

The First State Legislature, 1890-91, amended those sections of the 1888 law relating to the establishing of the government and maintenance of the University of Wyoming; this law increased the number of members of the Board of Trustees from seven to nine, who were appointed by the governor, with the consent of the senate, for a term of six years each; the Board of Trustees constitutes a body corporate by the name of "The Trustees of the University of Wyoming"; they have full custody of all properties of the University; the board is empowered to elect a president, secretary, and treasurer, the term of office of said officers and their duties to be fixed by the by-laws of the board.

The Sixteenth State Legislature, 1921, provided for the membership of the Board of Trustees, which included the governor as ex-officio member, other­wise the membership remained the same as of the 1890-91 law.

The law affecting the management of the University has not materially changed since 1890-91; the University is managed by a Board of Trustees, composed of nine members appointed by the governor, with the consent of the senate, for a period of six years each; the governor, the president of the University, and the superintendent of public instruction are ex-officio members of the board; the board elects its own officers, prescribes rules for the government of the University and all its branches; elects and prescribes officers, professors, instructors, and employees, and fixes the salary and term of each; prescribes the courses of study; it is charged with all of the property of the University, with authority to hold, manage, lease or dispose of said property according to law.

The Board of Trustees, through the president of the board, makes a biennial report to the governor on or before the first day in November immediately preceding the meeting of the State legislature, one copy filed with the Governor and one copy with each house of the State legislature.