Illinois Institute of Technology Illinois Institute of Technology , commonly called Illinois Tech or IIT , is a private Ph . D . - granting research university located in Chicago , in the U . S . state of Illinois , with programs in engineering , science , psychology , architecture , business , communications , industrial technology , information technology , design and law . History . IIT was formed in 1940 by the merger of Armour Institute of Technology ( founded in 1890 ) and Lewis Institute ( founded in 1895 ) . Armour Institute of Technology . The Armour Institute of Technology was founded in 1890 with a donation of one million dollars ( $ 25 . 2 million in 2012 dollars ) from Philip Danforth Armour , Sr . , a prominent Chicago meat packer and grain merchant . Armour had heard Chicago minister Frank W . Gunsaulus say that with a million dollars he would build a school that would be open to students of all backgrounds instead of just the elite . After the sermon , Armour approached Gunsaulus and asked if he was serious about his claim . When Gunsaulus said yes , Armour told him that if he came by his office in the morning , he would give him the million dollars . Armour also stipulated that Gunsaulus become the first president of the school , and Gunsaulus served as president of Armour Tech from its founding in 1890 until his death in 1921 . Gunsaulus ' s sermon thus became known as the " Million Dollar Sermon " . Centered at 33 Street and Armour Avenue ( now Federal Street ) , Armour Institute of Technology opened its doors on September 14 , 1890 . It shared the neighborhood now known as Bronzeville with many historic places : Comiskey Park was a few blocks away , west of what is now the Dan Ryan Expressway ; the land used to expand the campus in the 1940s through 1970s was home to many of Chicago ' s old famous jazz and blues clubs , with performers like Louis Armstrong highlighting the neighborhood . Lewis Institute . Founded in 1895 from the estate of the Chicago real estate investor Allen Cleveland Lewis , Lewis Institute stood where the United Center now stands . Allen Lewis was one of many investors to descend on Chicago after the 1871 Great Chicago Fire , and helped to rebuild the city ' s west side . Under its first director , George Noble Carman , Lewis Institute was the first institution to offer adult education programs , making it the first junior college in the United States . The Institute offered courses in engineering , sciences , and technology , but also featured courses in home economics and other domestic arts . Lewis Institute offered a program in which a young child was borrowed from a member of the community and would be cared for by students for up to a year . As the first President , Carman helped create North Central Association of Colleges and Schools , the first educational accreditation board . Lewis / Armour merger . The Great Depression in the 1920s and 1930s left Armour Institute and Lewis Institute looking for ways to expand programs and relieve debt . In the late 1930s , the Board of Trustees at Armour was greatly expanded , with many Chicago industrialists and businessmen joining the board to increase funding and support the institute . However , it was a proposal from Lewis ' s chairman Alex Bailey to Armour President Henry Townley Heald and Board Chair James Cunningham that would lead to the birth of IIT . While Armour ' s faculty and trustees supported the merger , some Lewis faculty and alumni opposed it , feeling that Lewis ' s legacy would be forgotten in the new school . In 1939 it was agreed to consolidate the two institutes and form the new school . Armour ' s campus became the permanent home of the new school while Lewis ' s campus was briefly repurposed by the City of Chicago as a civic building before being demolished for the construction of the Chicago Stadium . The resistance by Lewis supporters led to a court battle in which the original will of Allen C . Lewis was dissolved . The Lewis Institute and Armour Institute completed the merger in July 1940 , with the first academic year for the new Illinois Institute of Technology beginning in the fall of the same year . Growth and expansion . IIT continued to expand after the merger . As one of the first American universities to host a Navy V - 12 program during World War II the school saw a large increase in students and expanded the Armour campus beyond its original . Two years before the merger , German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe joined the then Armour Institute of Technology to head both Armour ' s and the Art Institute of Chicago ' s architecture program . The Art Institute would later separate and form its own program . Mies was given the task of designing a completely new campus , and the result was a spacious , open , campus set in contrast to the busy , crowded urban neighborhood around it . The first Mies - designed buildings were completed in the mid - 1940s , and construction on what is considered the " Mies Campus " continued until the early 1970s . Engineering and research also saw great growth and expansion from the post - war period until the early 1970s . IIT experienced its greatest period of growth from 1952 to 1973 under President John T . Rettaliata , a fluid dynamicist whose research accomplishments included work on early development of the jet engine and a seat on the National Aeronautics and Space Council . This period saw IIT as the largest engineering school in the United States , as stated in a feature in the September 1953 issue of Popular Science magazine . IIT housed many research organizations : IIT Research Institute ( formerly Armour Research Foundation and birthplace of magnetic recording wire and tape as well as audio and video cassettes ) , the Institute of Gas Technology , and the American Association of Railroads , among others . Three colleges merged with IIT after the 1940 Armor / Lewis merger : Institute of Design in 1949 , Chicago - Kent College of Law in 1969 , and Midwest College of Engineering in 1986 . IIT ' s Stuart School of Business was founded by a gift from Lewis Institute alumnus Harold Leonard Stuart in 1969 , and joined Chicago - Kent at IIT ' s Downtown Campus in 1992 ; it phased out its undergraduate program ( becoming graduate - only ) after Spring 1995 . ( An undergraduate business program focusing on technology and entrepreneurship was launched in Fall 2004 and was for a while administratively separate from the Stuart School . It is now part of the school , but remains on Main Campus . ) The Institute of Design , once housed on the Main Campus in S . R . Crown Hall , also phased out its undergraduate programs and moved downtown in the early 1990s . Though not used in official communication , the nickname " Illinois Tech " has long been a favorite of students , inspiring the name of the student newspaper ; ( renamed in 1928 from " Armour Tech News " to " TechNews " ) , and the former mascot of the university ' s collegiate sports teams , the Techawks . During the 1950s and 1960s , the nickname was actually more prevalent than " IIT . " This was reflected by the Chicago Transit Authority ' s Green Line rapid transit station at 35 and State being named " Tech - 35th " , but has since been changed to " 35th - Bronzeville - IIT . " Today . In 1994 , the National Commission on IIT considered leaving the Mies Main Campus and moving to the Chicago suburbs . Construction of a veritable wall of Chicago Housing Authority high - rises replaced virtually all of IIT ' s neighbors in the 1950s and 1960s , a well - meaning but flawed attempt to improve conditions in an economically declining portion of the city . The closest high - rise , Stateway Gardens , was located just south of the IIT campus boundary , the last building of which was demolished in 2006 . But the Dearborn Homes to the immediate north of campus still remain . The past decade has seen a redevelopment of Stateway Gardens into a new , mixed - income neighborhood dubbed Park Boulevard ; the completion of the new central station of the Chicago Police Department a block east of the campus ; and major commercial development at Roosevelt Road , just north of the campus , and residential development as close as Michigan Avenue on the east boundary of the school . Bolstered by a $ 120 million gift in the mid - 1990s from IIT alumnus Robert Pritzker , former chairman of IIT ' s Board of Trustees , and Robert Galvin , former chairman of the board and former Motorola executive , the university has benefited from a revitalization . The first new buildings on Main Campus since the " completion " of the Mies Campus in the early 1970s were finished in 2003 — Rem Koolhaas ' s McCormick Tribune Campus Center and Helmut Jahn ' s State Street Village . S . R . Crown Hall , a National Historic Landmark , saw renovation in 2005 and the renovation of Wishnick Hall was completed in 2007 . Undergraduate enrollment has breached 2 , 500 . To further boost their focus on biotechnology and the melding of business and technology , University Technology Park At IIT , an expansive research park , has been developed by remodeling former Institute of Gas Technology and research buildings on the south end of Main Campus . Academics . Academic units . IIT is divided into : four colleges ( Armour College of Engineering , College of Science and Letters , College of Architecture , Chicago - Kent College of Law ) , two institutes ( Institute of Design , Institute of Psychology ) , two schools ( School of Applied Technology , Stuart School of Business ) , and a number of research centers , some of which provide academic programs independent of the other academic units . While many maintain undergraduate programs , some only offer graduate or certificate programs . In 2003 , IIT administrators split the former Armour College of Engineering and Science into two colleges which are now known as the Armour College of Engineering and the College of Science and Letters . The Armour College of Engineering is composed of five departments : the Department of Biomedical Engineering , the Department of Biological and Chemical Engineering , the Department of Civil , Architectural and Environmental Engineering , the Department of Mechanical , Materials and Aerospace Engineering , and the Department of Computer and Electrical Engineering . The College of Science and Letters is divided into six departments : the Department of Applied Mathematics , the Department of Biological , Chemical and Physical Sciences , the Department of Computer Science , the Lewis Department of Humanities , the Department of Mathematics and Science Education , and the Department of Social Sciences . The Institute of Design was founded in 1937 as the New Bauhaus : Chicago School of Design by Laszlo Moholy - Nagy . It became known as the Institute of Design in 1944 and later joined Illinois Institute of Technology in 1949 . IIT also contains the College of Architecture . This College began in 1895 when trustees of Armour Institute and Art Institute merged the architectural programs of both schools to form the Chicago School of Architecture of Armour Institute . The Institute of Psychology , now known as the College of Psychology , was created in 1996 as part of the Lewis College of Science and Letters ; the first psychology degrees were awarded in 1926 . The School of Applied Technology was founded as the Center for Professional Development in 2001 in order to provide technology oriented education for working professionals . In December 2009 , IIT announced the formation of the School of Applied Technology , composed of undergraduate and graduate degree programs in Industrial Technology and Management ( INTM ) and Information Technology and Management ( ITM ) , as well as non - credit Professional Learning Programs ( PLP ) . These programs were all formerly part of the Center for Professional Development . Professional Learning Programs offers non - credit continuing education courses and certificates , corporate training , a Professional Engineering Exam Review program , international programs including English as a Second Language instruction , short courses and seminars ranging from a few hours to several days in length . Chicago - Kent College of Law began in 1886 with law clerks receiving tutorials from Appellate Judge Joseph M . Bailey in order to prepare for the newly instated Illinois Bar Examination . By 1888 these evening sessions developed into formal classes and the Chicago College of Law was established . It wasn ' t until 1969 that the school was incorporated into Illinois Institute of Technology . With a bequest from IIT alumnus and financier Harold Leonard Stuart the IIT Stuart School of Business was established in 1969 . In addition to the M . B . A . and Ph . D . , IIT Stuart offers specialized programs in Finance , Mathematical Finance ( provided in conjunction with the IIT Department of Applied Mathematics ) , Environmental Management and Sustainability ( provided in conjunction with the IIT Chicago - Kent College of Law and Department of Civic , Architectural , and Environmental Engineering ) , Marketing Communications , and Public Administration . IIT also offers many dual admission programs including programs in medicine , optometry , pharmacy , law , and business . The programs in medicine are particularly competitive and include an 8 - year program with Midwestern University leading to a D . O . degree and a 6 - year program with Rush University leading to a M . D . degree , both of which are earned after satisfactory completion of a bachelor ' s degree from IIT . The IIT / Midwestern program accepts anywhere from 5 - 10 students each year , and the IIT / Rush program accepts anywhere from 0 - 4 students each year . Campus . IIT has five campuses : Two other undergraduate institutions share IIT ' s Main Campus : VanderCook College of Music and Shimer College . Both institutions share dormitories with IIT and offer cross - registration for IIT students . The IIT main campus is centered around 33rd and State Streets , approximately south of the Chicago Loop in the historic Bronzeville neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago , part of the Douglas community area . Also known as the Black Metropolis District , the area is a landmark in African - American history . Following rapid growth during the Great Migration of African - Americans from the south between 1910 and 1920 , it became home to numerous African - American owned businesses and cultural institutions and offered an alternative to the race restrictions that were prevalent in the rest of the city . The area was home to author Gwendolyn Brooks , civil rights activist Ida B . Wells , bandleader Louis Armstrong , pilot Bessie Coleman and many other famous African - Americans during the mid - 20th century . The nine extant structures from that period were added jointly to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986 and designated a Chicago Landmark in 1998 . In 1941 , the Chicago Housing Authority began erecting massive public housing developments in the area . By 1990 , the IIT campus was encircled by high - rise housing projects rife with crime . The projects were demolished beginning in the 1999 , and the area began to revitalize , with major renovations to King Drive and many of the historic structures and an influx of new , upscale , housing developments . Neighborhood features include U . S . Cellular Field , home of the Chicago White Sox , Burnham Park and 31st Street Beach on the Lake Michigan waterfront , and historical buildings from the heyday of the Black Metropolis era , including the Chicago Bee Building , the Eighth Regiment Armory , and the Overton Hygienic Building . The campus is bordered on the west by the Chicago ' L ' Red Line , which runs parallel to Lake Michigan north to Rogers Park and south to 95th street . The Green Line bisects the campus and runs north to the Loop and then west to the near west suburbs and south to the Museum Campus and the University of Chicago . Architecture . The campus , roughly bounded between 31st and 35th streets , Michigan Avenue and the Dan Ryan Expressway , was designed by modernist architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe , " one of the great figures of 20th - century architecture " , who chaired the IIT School of Architecture from 1938 to 1958 . Van der Rohe ' s master plan for the IIT campus was one of the most ambitious projects he ever conceived and the campus , with twenty of his works , is the greatest concentration of his buildings in the world . The layout of the campus departs radically from " traditional college quadrangles and limestone buildings " . The materials are inspired by the factories and warehouses of Chicago ' s South Side and " embod [ y ] 20th century methods and materials : steel and concrete frames with curtain walls of brick and glass . " The campus was landscaped by van der Rohe ' s close colleague at IIT , Alfred Caldwell , " the last representative of the Prairie School of landscape architects . " Known as " the nature poet " , Caldwell ' s plan reinforced van der Rohe ' s design with " landscaping planted in a free - flowing manner , which in its interaction with the pristine qualities of the architecture , introduce [ d ] a poetic aspect . " On the west side of Main Campus are three red brick buildings that were original to Armour Institute , built between 1891 and 1901 . In 1938 , Ludwig Mies van der Rohe began his 20 - year tenure as director of IIT ' s School of Architecture ( 1938 – 1959 ) . The university was on the verge of building a brand new campus , to be one of the nation ' s first federally funded urban renewal projects . Mies was given carte blanche in the large commission , and the university grew fast enough during and after World War II to allow much of the new plan to be realized . From 1943 to 1957 , several new Mies buildings rose across campus , including the S . R . Crown Hall , which houses the architecture school , and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2001 . Though Mies had emphasized his wish to complete the campus he had begun , commissions from the late 50s onward were given to Skidmore , Owings , and Merrill ( SOM ) , prompting Mies to never return to the campus that had changed architecture the world over . SOM architect Walter Netsch designed a few buildings , including the new library that Mies had wished to create , all of them similar to Mies ' s style . By the late 1960s , campus addition projects were given to SOM ' s Myron Goldsmith , who had worked with Mies during his education at IIT and thus was able to design several new buildings to harmonize well with the original campus . In 1976 , the American Institute of Architects recognized the campus as one of the 200 most significant works of architecture in the United States . The new campus center , designed by Rem Koolhaas , and a new state - of - the - art residence hall designed by Helmut Jahn , State Street Village , opened in 2003 . These were the first new buildings built on the Main Campus in 32 years . In 1976 , American Institute of Architects named the IIT campus one of the 200 most significant works of architecture in the United States . The IIT Main Campus was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2005 . Sustainability . In 2010 , IIT received the Princeton Review ' s highest sustainability rating among universities in Illinois , tied with the University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign . Student life . There are numerous student organizations available on campus , including religious groups , academic groups , and student activity groups . Three of IIT ' s major student organizations serve the entire student body : the Student Government Association ( SGA ) , the Student Union Board ( UB ) , and " TechNews " . SGA is the governing student body of IIT and acts as a liaison between the university administration and the student body , serves as a forum to express student opinion , and provides certain services to student organizations such as official recognition and distribution of funds . UB serves as the main event programming group and plans over 180 on and off - campus events for students per year . Since 2005 , UB has been particularly active and has increased the frequency of student activities , and is responsible for the emergence of the school spirit and booster group Scarlet Fever ; UB it has been active since its founding on November 23 , 1938 . " TechNews " is the campus paper and serves as a news outlet for campus interests and as another outlet for student opinion in both a weekly paper edition and online format ; it has existed since at least the 1930s . IIT hosts a campus radio station , WIIT , with an antenna located atop Main Building and a radio studio in the McCormick Tribune Campus Center . In September 2007 , IIT opened a nine - hole disc golf course which weaves around the academic buildings on the Main Campus and is the first disc golf course to appear within the Chicago city limits . In anticipation of the opening of the McCormick Tribune Campus Center , the on - campus pub and bowling alley known as " The Bog " ceased operations in 2003 . However , in response to students , faculty , and staff who missed the former campus hangout , the Bog reopened in February 2007 and is now open every Thursday and Friday night offering bowling , billiards , table tennis , and video games . The Bog is also home to the campus bar , which serves beer and wine , and hosts weekly events such as comedians , live bands , or karaoke nights on its stage . On the sixth floor of Main Building is the IIT Model Railroad Club . Founded in 1948 , the club builds and runs an H0 scale model railway layout that occupies much of the floor . In the fall of 2007 , the third generation of a cappella groups was formed , The TechTonics , a coed group of students . Within a year the organization expanded and now includes an all - male group , the Crown Joules , and an all - female group , the X - Chromotones . IIT A Cappella performs a variety of shows on campus as well as off campus and in the midwest . They perform shows at the end of each semester which showcase everything they have learned . The Illinois Institute of Technology Main Campus has an established Greek System , which consists of 6 fraternities and 3 sororities . Fraternities Pi Kappa Phi , Delta Tau Delta , Alpha Sigma Phi , Phi Kappa Sigma , and Triangle fraternity and sororities Kappa Phi Delta , and Alpha Sigma Alpha have chapter houses . The Zeta Pi Omega sorority and Omega Delta fraternity do not . Athletics . Illinois Tech ( IIT ) athletic teams , known as the Scarlet Hawks , competed in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics ( NAIA ) at the NAIA Division I level in the Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference ( CCAC ) . Men ' s sports include baseball , basketball , cross country , soccer , swimming and track & field ; while women ' s sports include basketball , cross country , lacrosse , soccer , swimming , track & field and volleyball . The university will be transitioning to NCAA division 3 athletics in the fall of 2013 . The Athletic Department is one of the few IIT departments which uses " Illinois Tech " instead of " IIT " , and has done so since the beginning of IIT in 1940 . IIT discontinued its men ' s and women ' s basketball program after the 2008 - 09 season . , but it was re - instated beginning the 2012 - 13 season . Recently , IIT even started a cricket team as a part of non - varsity sports level . Their cricket team competes in Division II of the Midwest Cricket Conference .