# Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences

The Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts & Sciences, sometimes abbreviated KSAS, is an academic division of the Johns Hopkins University, a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. The school is located on the university's Homewood campus. Along with the Whiting School of Engineering, it is one of the core undergraduate teaching institutions of Johns Hopkins, and offers both undergraduate and graduate programs in the humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences.

## History

Johns Hopkins University, founded as the nation's first research university in 1876, originally hired "thirty of the profoundest scholars in the varied field of literature that can be secured, and which, with its magnificent endowment, will undoubtedly become one of the leading institutions of learning in America".
The current School of Arts and Sciences was formed when the Faculty of Philosophy merged with the Faculty of Engineering in 1967–1968.
   It doesn't have the glamour of giving to a medical school. People don't realize that everything emanates from the arts and science college. It is the nucleus of the foundation of the university as a whole.
In December 1992, Zanvyl Krieger, a 1928 alumnus, gave a $50 million challenge grant to the School of Arts and Sciences, "the largest monetary gift in the university's history and one of the largest in American higher education". The school was renamed for Krieger, who explained that he chose to give the gift to the arts and sciences school because "People don't realize that everything emanates from the arts and science college. It is the nucleus of the foundation of the university as a whole."".
In November 2013, the university released its draft "Strategic Planning Final Report for the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences". Under the plan, fewer graduate students would be admitted (with enrollment cuts of 25% across departments), but graduate stipends were to be increased. In addition, more junior teaching faculty would replace retiring senior faculty.
Students objected in October 2016 when closure of the Humanities Center was under consideration. In January 2017, the school's dean assured them that the center would not close, but would be reorganized around one of three proposals: "...keeping the center’s name while rethinking its role in relation to other humanities departments; renaming the department as something that more 'clearly conveys its identity and focus'; or transforming the humanities center into a comparative literature department..."
October 2017 brought cancellation of the institution's Russian major, which was no longer compatible with the partner program in Russian at Goucher College. Russian courses continue to be taught, but a major in Russian is not available.
A university-wide promotion and tenure committee was established in 2020, to be piloted for three years and then evaluated.

## Academics

KSAS's educational offerings include over 60 undergraduate majors and minors, more than 40 full-time graduate programs, and over 20 part-time graduate programs.
Beginning with the class entering in the Fall of 2024, undergraduates at the School of Arts and Science are required to complete a comprehensive set of distribution requirements known as "Foundational Abilities" (FAs) in order to graduate. The six Foundational Abilities include Writing and Communication (15 credits required) Science and Data (15 credits), Culture and Aesthetics (15 credits), Citizens and Society (15 credits), Ethics and Foundations (15 credits), and Projects and Methods (6 credits).
All first-year undergraduates at the Krieger School are required to take part in a First-Year Seminar, which are designed to help students connect with their peers and faculty while settling into their freshman year of college, and the University Writing Program, which offers a Reintroduction to Writing course.

### Humanities

Humanities at the School of Arts and Sciences consists of 9 academic departments as well as the Program in Archaeology and the Writing Seminars program.
* Department of Classics
* Department of Comparative Thought and Literature
* Department of English
* Department of History
* Department of the History of Art
* Department of the History of Science and Technology
* Department of Modern Languages & Literatures
* Department of Near Eastern Studies
* William H. Miller III Department of Philosophy
In February 2018, investor and alumnus Bill Miller donated $75 million to the philosophy department, to be used to increase the department's faculty and expand undergraduate and graduate programs. The philosophy department was subsequently renamed the William H. Miller III Department Philosophy in his honor.

### Natural sciences

Natural sciences at the School of Arts and Sciences consists of 8 academic departments as well as the Programs in Behavioral Biology, Molecular Biophysics, Neuroscience, and the Post-Baccalaureate Pre-Medical Program.
* Department of Biology
* Thomas C. Jenkins Department of Biophysics
* Department of Chemistry
* Department of Cognitive Science
* Morton K. Blaustein Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences
* Department of Mathematics
* William H. Miller III Department of Physics and Astronomy
* Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences

### Social sciences

Social sciences at the School of Arts and Sciences consists of 4 academic departments as well the Program in Public Health.
* Department of Anthropology
* Department of Economics
* Department of Political Science
* Department of Sociology

### Interdisciplinary Programs

* Chemistry-Biology Interface Program (graduate)
* Medicine, Science, and the Humanities Major
* Program for the Study of Women, Gender, and Sexuality
* Program in Cell, Molecular, Developmental Biology, and Biophysics (graduate)
* Program in East Asian Studies
* Program in Film & Media Studies
* Program in Environmental Science & Studies
* Program in International Studies
* Program in Islamic Studies
* Leonard and Helen R. Stulman Program in Jewish Studies
* Program in Latin American, Caribbean, and Latinx Studies
* Program in Museums and Society
* Program in Music
* Program in Theatre Arts & Studies
* University Writing Program

### Advanced academic programs

The Johns Hopkins University offers part-time graduate programs through the Advanced Academic Programs (AAP), a division of the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences centered in Washington, DC.

## Notable Faculty
### Natural Sciences

* Charles L. Bennett - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Physics and Astronomy; principal investigator of NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe
* Caterina Consani - Professor, Department of Mathematics; namesake of the Consani–Scholten quintic
* Patricia Janak - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences
* Rachel Green - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Biology
* Richard L. Huganir - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences
* Emily Riehl - Professor, Department of Mathematics
* Adam Riess - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Departments of Physics and Astronomy & Earth and Planetary Sciences; shared the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics for providing evidence for the accelerating expansion of the universe
* Vyacheslav Shokurov - Professor, Department of Mathematics
* Christopher Sogge - J.J. Sylvester Professor, Department of Mathematics; editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Mathematics
* Sabine Stanley - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences
* Alan Yuille - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Cognitive Science
* Carl Wu - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Biology

### Social Sciences

* Monica Prasad - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Sociology
* Stephen L. Morgan - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Department of Sociology
* Vesla Weaver - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Departments of Political Science and Sociology

### Humanities

* Jane Bennett - Andrew W. Mellon Professor in Humanities, Departments of Comparative Thought and Literature (CTL) and Political Science
* Christopher Cannon - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Departments of English & Classics
* Sean M. Carroll - Homewood Professor of Natural Philosophy, Department of Philosophy and Department of Physics and Astronomy
* N. D. B. Connolly - Herbert Baxter Adams Associate Professor of History
* Hanna Pickard - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, William H. Miller III Department of Philosophy
* Ian Phillips - Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, William H. Miller III Department of Philosophy & Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences
* Lawrence M. Principe - Drew Professor of the Humanities; Director, Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe