Original degree offerings in agriculture and mechanic arts have expanded to include eighty-nine baccalaureate, eighty master's, and fifty doctoral degree programs. A small college is now a major research-intensive university, with Colleges of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Design, Education and Psychology, Engineering, Forest Resources, Humanities and Social Sciences, Management, Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Textiles, and Veterinary Medicine.
The institution that would become North Carolina State University opened as the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts in October of 1889, on land donated to the state by the Pullen family of Raleigh, North Carolina. The college was established in a climate of concern about the challenges facing North Carolina in the post-Civil War period. Its founders were optimistic about the ability of an educational institution to form the character of its students. They hoped the new college would enable its students to promote the economic and cultural transformation of the state. They sought a "people's college" that would make higher education more widely available to citizens of North Carolina, and would address their need for effectiveness in public and private life, enabling them to live richer and more productive lives.
Originated by act of the General Assembly of the state of North Carolina in March 1887 as a college under the terms of the federal Land-Grant College (Morrill) Act of 1862, the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts was designated the institution in North Carolina "where the leading object shall be, without excluding other scientific and classical studies, and including military tactics, to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and mechanic arts, in such a manner as the legislature of states may respectively prescribe, in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the several pursuits and professions of life" (Eddy, p. 1).
Also central to the young land-grant college's mission was the commitment to making contributions to the economic development of the state of North Carolina. Early programs in agriculture and engineering represented its commitment to applied science. Later, through its extension mission, the College would provide direct assistance to farmers and industrialists everywhere in the state.
From the beginning, the curricula of the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts were shaped by the belief that all students needed advanced (postsecondary) study in a broad array of basic disciplines as well as specialized study in the College's two degree programs, the developing discipline of agriculture or in the more established discipline of engineering. In 1893 degree offerings were expanded to include majors in the sciences. Addressing the needs of 90 percent of North Carolina's citizens who lived in rural areas, the College sought not only to improve their skill as farmers and to nurture a growing industrial base, but also to enhance their effectiveness as productive citizens and to improve the quality of their lives.
Growth of the new College was rapid, as was the scope of its mission. In 1889, two years after the federal Hatch Act created a national system of agricultural experiment stations, North Carolina's station was transferred to the College. By this time, Hatch funds were already supporting research in chemical, agricultural, botanical, horticultural, and entomological divisions. The station also provided weather information to the public. A veterinary division was added in 1893, and a poultry division in 1895.
At the turn of the century, cooperative extension activities were also being developed across the state.
The first state extension agent was named in 1907 and moved his office to North Carolina College in 1909. By that time, twenty counties had farm demonstration agents, and the College had forged a memorandum of understanding with the U.S. Department of Agriculture for cooperative demonstration work. The federal Smith-Lever Act of 1914 provided for a system of federal, state and county cooperation in expanding demonstration work, and the College became headquarters for extension in the state of North Carolina. Thus, early in the life of the College, research and extension were formally organized as major components of the institution's activities.
By 1917 enrollment of the institution on the Hillsborough Road had grown to over 400, and its name was officially changed to North Carolina State College of Agriculture and Engineering. A statement of mission from 1924 described State College's work as the search "for new truths" and the ambition "to make new applications of old truths." "Our College," this statement proclaims, "seeks to instruct, to give definiteness of purpose to study, in order to lead the youth to a more wholesome life and to play a large part in the advancement of social welfare." State College understood its mission as not limited to economic or vocational but as promoting the enhancement of life in the broadest sense for the people of North Carolina.
State College also participated in the development of graduate education among American institutions of higher education, creating its first masters' programs (in chemistry, physics, horticulture, agriculture, and mechanical engineering) in the late 1890s. Graduate offerings continued to expand in the early years of the twentieth century and led to the establishment of the Graduate School in the 1920s. By 1924, the Graduate School offered research degrees at the Master's and Ph.D. levels as well as various professional and non-research degrees, and awarded its first Ph.D. (in sociology) in 1926. As graduate programs developed, so did research activity.
In the aftermath of World War I, faced with climbing enrollments and aware that society both locally and nationally was going through extensive changes, State College engaged in a major reevaluation of its mission and program. It broadened its traditional offerings in the arts and sciences by introducing courses in modern languages, economics, and sociology and enriching its offering in mathematics and the natural sciences. Programs in forestry, textiles, education, and landscape architecture were also established.
In 1922 the board of trustees appointed a commission chaired by George F. Zook of the U.S. Bureau of Education to review facilities, organization, and mission. In the report of his commission, presented in 1923, Zook proposed that State College's broad mission of service necessitated the development of a comprehensive effort to understand and address the needs of the people of North Carolina. Offerings in agriculture and engineering would have to be strengthened and enriched; they would have to be joined by new disciplines if State College was to fulfill its traditional mission.
As this report was implemented in the 1920s, NCSU entered what E. L. Cloyd, dean of students, heralded as "its greatest period, the period of achievement and service" (Agromeck 1924). In response to the recommendations of the Zook Commission, the institution was organized into three undergraduate schoolsAgriculture, Engineering, and Science and Businessplus the Graduate School. Research and extension also expanded. An engineering experiment station was formed in 1923, and a general extension program began to offer correspondence courses to local residents in 1924. The School of Science and Business established the Bureau of Economic and Social Research to examine rural organization, the economic problems of farmers and textiles workers, and other issues related to the social and economic welfare of North Carolinians.
The institution of this era saw itself as addressing the needs of the people of North Carolina in rich and diverse ways. Not settling for mere economic betterment, the College sought, in the words of President Brooks, "a larger life for the people of the state," by enriching the quality of rural life, measuring the state's natural resources, promoting the development of industry, and extending our understanding of the physical world and of human relationships. Women were also admitted to the student body at this time, albeit in small numbers. In 1926 Jane S. McKimmon received the first degree awarded a woman by North Carolina. State College.
Thus, in the late 1920s, the future North Carolina State University was well on its way to its present configuration and status. With its evolution toward comprehensiveness in degree programs and the establishment of graduate, research, and extension programs, State College was following the pattern displayed nationally by land-grant institutions. NCSU's initial recognition as possessing an appropriate mission and professional standards of practice through association with the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools came in the 1920s, leading to its accreditation in 1928.
The Great Depression of the 1930s prompted the state of North Carolina to restructure dramatically the activities of all state-supported educational institutions. Elimination of duplication in programs in the name of economy was the order of the day. The General Assembly of North Carolina in 1931 authorized consolidation of the University of North Carolina, North Carolina State College, and the North Carolina College for Women into the consolidated University of North Carolina. Initial forms of this proposal would have taken away from State College all degree-granting authority, reducing the institution to the status of a junior college. The final version preserved degree-granting authority for State College, but only in the fields of agriculture and engineering, and only at the undergraduate level.
Driven by the most narrow of disciplinary definitions, the new consolidated university shifted a small engineering program at the university in Chapel Hill to Raleigh, but moved all degree programs in mathematics, natural sciences, humanities, and social sciences to Chapel Hill. Graduate courses in agriculture and engineering continued on the Raleigh campus, but the degrees earned were conferred by the consolidated University at graduation exercises of the Chapel Hill campus, not by North Carolina State College.
For the two decades after the loss of graduate degree-granting authority in all fields and undergraduate programs outside the Schools of Agriculture, Engineering, and Textiles, State College of necessity channeled its creative energies in directions closely linked to those fields. Developments in a number of areas formed the basis of future achievement and national recognition of excellence in the modern era. The network of experimental farms was brought from state management under college control, enhancing the college's effectiveness in agricultural research and extension activities. The broad understanding of societal need and of institutional service persisted, through such activities as the expansion of 4-H Clubs and other outreach programs. Strengths in engineering enabled State College to make significant contributions to national mobilization during World War II.
These developments laid the groundwork for institutional growth and development after World War II, when American higher education was transformed by the dramatic influx of students. North Carolina State College was at the forefront of this development. In 1947, over 5,000 students, double the pre- war total, enrolled for classes, and they demanded greater variety in academic offerings. In 1948, the right to bestow graduate degrees was restored to the campus. Programs in engineering and agriculture continued to diversify. Offerings in architecture and landscape architecture developed professional status that would lead to the establishment of a School of Design in 1948. New programs in geological engineering and aeronautical engineering and in plant pathology, entomology, and wildlife conservation were established. Programs in forestry continued to grow, leading to the establishment of an independent School of Forestry in 1950. Gradually, State College began to recover ground lost in consolidation.
During the 1950s research activities expanded across the institution. Research brought money and prestige to the institution as well as a need to centralize control over contract research. Upon recommendation of a consulting firm in 1954, a committee established university-level policies for research, and research committees were established in most schools. Concern about contract research also led to the establishment of the Research Triangle Institute in 1958 as an affiliate of State College, Duke University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
In 1954 the first Faculty Senate was convened to give faculty a greater voice in institutional governance; it immediately undertook to conduct the first modern institutional long-range plan. That same year, a study conducted by a management consulting firm recommended sweeping internal reorganization and more campus authority and autonomy under the consolidated university system. Implementation of this report led to consolidation and restoration of authority for State College in the office of the chancellor, and to more campus autonomy in the development of academic programs and granting of degrees.
Demand for expanded academic offerings in the natural and social sciences and in the humanities to support education in the professional schools and to expand educational opportunities for citizens of Raleigh led to renewed requests for degree-granting authority in these areas. A Ford Foundation study in 1955 recommended that such degree-granting authority be given the campus, noting that North Carolina State College was out of step with the majority of other land-grant colleges in not awarding such degrees.
In the midst of this period of heightened institutional autonomy and renewed understanding of the land-grant mission, two events took place that would establish the foundations of the modern North Carolina State University. The first was the development of a campuswide Long-Range Plan, published in 1958, that was based on a wide-ranging study of the institution conducted by the newly constituted Faculty Senate. The second was NCSU's first self-study conducted under the auspices of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and published in 1963. These documents represent the foundation for the development of today's North Carolina State University.
Affirming State College's historic role as a land-grant university, the Long-Range Plan of 1958 described the institution and the state of North Carolina as being in a time of transition, requiring new understanding of the people's needs and institutional approaches to meeting them. Calling for renewed support for research and extension activities, and for greater institutional autonomy in campus decision making and in granting of graduate degrees, it also recommended comprehensiveness in academic offerings. The plan declared that "strong degree programs in the basic sciences and in mathematics [and in] the humanities and social sciences should be authorized and implemented at once."
The authors of the self-study of 1963 understood their work as affirming and extending the work of the Long-Range Plan of 1958. In the view of this self-study, State College was a university already, in everything but name. The recommendations of the 1958 Long-Range Plan had begun to be implemented, as evidenced by the recently founded Schools of Physical Sciences and Applied Mathematics and General Studies, which joined the Schools of Agriculture, Engineering, Textiles, Education, Design, and Forestry, and the newly independent Graduate School.
The "total mission" of North Carolina State College, wrote the framers of the 1963 self-study, "stems largely from the fact that it is the land-grant institution of the state of North Carolina," seeking ever more "complete service," to "extend the educational services of the institution to the very borders of the state." It was then viewed as "the technological university dedicated to advancing the major technologies of man through teaching, research, and technical assistance." Yet its mission was to be not narrowly vocational or technical but to include "the sciences and arts on which [the technologies] are based," as well as "to cultivate the aesthetic and social understandings which ensure the quality of life technology helps to make possible in a free society."
In 1968, following reaccreditation, NCSU produced another long-range plan, in which the details of today's university are clearly taking shape. Since the 1963 self-study the College had become a university not only in function and mission, but also in name: North Carolina State University. Further consolidation of higher education in North Carolina had created a sixteen- campus system the terms of which secured for NCSU both the title university and much of the campus autonomy sought by earlier plans and studies. The Mission Statement of the new university articulated a broad vision of service "by providing professional and liberal education" for the citizens of North Carolina, the nation, and the world, and promoting "democratic ideals" by emphasizing "the ultimate worth of the individual" and "developing leaders who will assume responsibility in all facets of society for the preservation and enlargement of democracy's heritage."
The self-study of 1973 looked back on the previous decade as one of dramatic change. In the past decade, the authors noted, "the University reached its maturity." No longer just "a technological university," NCSU had become, they noted, "in most respects a comprehensive university with the earlier technological and agricultural emphasis balanced by depth and breadth in the social sciences and humanities." With the establishment of a School of Liberal Arts, comprehensiveness in degree offerings at the undergraduate level had been achieved, and graduate education in the arts and sciences had begun with programs in the master's level in the humanities and at the masters and doctoral level in the natural and social sciences. In this time of change and disciplinary diversification, NCSU adhered "to its land-grant heritage" because it sought "to provide educational opportunities for all, to conduct research for [human] betterment, and to disseminate knowledge and information to all people."
Overall, the steering committee of that self-study noted the expansion of programmatic offerings at both the undergraduate and graduate levels and the emergence of the institution as a major research university. They were pleased with the construction of the (first) library tower and the emergence of the library as a true university facility. They applauded the development of the School of General Studies into the School of Liberal Arts, offering undergraduate degrees in the humanities and social sciences, fulfilling one of the objectives of the 1960s self-study.
Nevertheless, they felt that if NCSU were to achieve its potential and to fulfill its mission for the people of North Carolina, it still needed to achieve four goals.
1. The University should remain dedicated to the tradition of scholarship and service, and in particular to its original land-grant mission.
2. Emphasis on agriculture and engineering, important as these fields are, is not sufficient; the broader goals of the modern university can not be attained without excellence in the natural and social sciences and in the liberal arts.
3. Efficient approaches to new and complex (interdisciplinary) problems require recombinations of skills traditionally found in widely separated administrative units of the University; administrative structures should be updated to facilitate such recombinations.
4. The University in its academic programs will, to an increasing degree, continue to emphasize its advanced undergraduate and graduate programs.
In 1978 North Carolina State University became a Research I public university, one of only two in the state. Extension also expanded and diversified. By the 1980s, each college and school was actively engaged in all three dimensions of NCSU's mission. The self-study of the 1980s spoke of NCSU as "a public land-grant comprehensive university" with nine academic schools, a graduate school, and "extensive programs of research and extension and public service." A ninth school, the School of Veterinary Medicine, had joined the eight continuing from the early seventies, while the School of Physical Sciences and Applied Mathematics had become the School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, and the School of Liberal Arts was renamed, more descriptively, the School of Humanities and Social Sciences.
In the early 1980s, NCSU received a "second land grant" of nearly 1,000 acres next to its main campus, which had become cramped with one hundred years of development. NCSU sees the Centennial Campus as a chance to reaffirm its mission as a research university in the land-grant tradition and as a symbol of the University's second century. At a time when complex modern problems are demanding multidisciplinary approaches and partnerships with public agencies and industries, NCSU suddenly has the room to facilitate new alliances that cross disciplinary and organizational boundaries. To this end, the Centennial Campus master plan calls for a rich mixture of tenants (including university, corporate, and government activities) and a diverse mix of uses (including teaching, research, outreach, housing, retail, and leisure).
One way of discussing the history of North Carolina State University is to note how each revision of institutional understanding expands the scope of its vision. Looking back on a growth from local to regional to national aspirations, the self-study of 1983 articulates a new and even more ambitious goal, "to achieve and maintain `world-class' status." Speaking confidently of NCSU as one of "two major research universities" in North Carolina, this self-study affirms that the "special mission of NCSU in the state's system of higher education stems from its land-grant origins." NCSU is thus a "people's university" that "is service oriented and maintains a direct relevance to the development of the people of the State, their economy, their environment, and the competence of their educational, social, and governmental institutions." Having become a "major center of graduate study, research, and public service," NCSU affirms "that knowledge acquired through research and teaching be utilized for the economic and social benefit of the people."
In 1990 the chancellor responded to a request of the General Administration of The University of North Carolina to conduct a review of institutional mission by appointing a campuswide review committee to establish a new statement of institutional mission and long-term institutional goals. The resulting Mission Statement, adopted by NCSU's Board of Trustees on February 23, 1991, forms the basis of this, NCSU's self-study for the 1990s. The 1991 Mission Statement defines NCSU confidently as a "comprehensive Research I university in the land-grant tradition." It echoes the themes of past understandings when it reaffirms the service orientation of the institution and articulates a broad understanding of the human needs that NCSU aspires to meet. It renews NCSU's commitment to nurturing human development into the next century.
Since NCSU's last self-study, therefore, several major institutional developments have taken place. There has been renewed dedication to coordinated planning at a university level. This has led appropriately to an effort to establish effective assessment of educational outcomes and to incorporate the results of assessment into institutional planning. This move is embodied in the creation of the Office of University Planning and Analysis out of the offices of University Planning and Institutional Research.
Acting on a major recommendation of the 1983 self-study, NCSU has sought sources of funding outside the system of state apportionment. This has resulted in the successful completion of two major capital-fund drives and the reorganization of all NCSU fund-raising activities into a single, coordinated effort.
In terms of organizational development, a new College of Management has been created, incorporating the Departments of Economics, Accounting, and Business Management, which were formerly housed in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. In addition, the Division of Undergraduate Studies has been created to take special responsibilities for undergraduate education and the implementation of new general education requirements.
The 1994 self-study inevitably revisits the concerns of our predecessors. As we look back, we note another decade of dramatic institutional change. In terms of the goals set for us by the self-study of 1973, we find much to celebrate. In large measure because of the implementation of the goals defined by the long-range plans of 1958 and 1968 and the self-study of 1973, we find that growth and development have continued, perhaps beyond the dreams of our predecessors in 1973.
One measure of how far we have come is that we now seek not only to develop a certain kind of institution but to achieve preeminence as an institution of that type. We point with justifiable pride at the overall excellence of our faculty. We celebrate the continued improvement in the overall quality of our students and their substantial achievements. We delight in the potential of our Centennial Campus and seek creative new ties with government and industry. We enjoy our close ties to the people of North Carolina through our extension programs, and seek creative ways to be of service.
The goals defined twenty years ago also pose questions and challenges in the areas of mission, program, organizational structure, and educational emphasis. While we reaffirm our commitment to the land-grant tradition, we raise questions about our understanding of people's needs in a changing world and the adequacy of our understanding of service. While we celebrate our achievements in scholarship and research and in teaching advanced undergraduate and graduate students, we are challenged to reconsider the
importance of basic and general education. We have not yet achieved the goal of comprehensiveness we have pursued since the 1920s and which has been recommended in three cycles of self-study. We question how this aspect of institutional development affects the fulfillment of our mission to be a comprehensive research university and influences our aspirations for preeminence.
We also note that for many members of our community, issues of institutional structure, planning, and decision making are still significant if not dominant concerns. Twenty years ago, a sense of impending change in the character of academic disciplines seemed to necessitate structural changes to bring together widely separated administrative units. Ten years ago, the need for more effective allocation of resources mandated a nontraditional self-study focusing on institutional structures for decision making and planning.
In our review of the NCSU of the early 1990s, we have thus found some old questions resurfacing and some new ones emerging. There is a broad sense on campus that North Carolina State University is at a historic crossroads, with much achievement to celebrate and with great opportunities before us. While much has been accomplished, much remains to be done. The vocation of land-grant institution is now a time-honored and respected calling. Indeed, the land-grant model of an institution devoted to research, teaching, and public service has become standard rhetorical fare for all of American higher education. As a historical land-grant institution, part of NCSU's responsibility to the future is to keep the land-grant concept alive by rediscovering its scope and worth in each new generation.
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Eddy, Edward D. The Land-Grant Movement: A Capsule History of the Educational Revolution which Established Colleges for all the People. Washington, D.C.: American Association of Land-Grant Colleges and State Universities, 1958.
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North Carolina State University Mission Statement. NCSU: 1991.
Reagan, Alice Elizabeth. North Carolina State University: A Narrative History. NCSU Alumni Association: 1986.
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Self-Study: North Carolina State University. NCSU: 1984.
Zook, George F. Report on a Survey of the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Engineering. Raleigh: Bynum Printing Company, 1923.
