Editing Illinois State University (section)

==History==
ISU was founded in 1857, the same year Illinois' first Board of Education was convened and two years after the Free School Act was passed by the state legislature. Among its supporters were judge and future Supreme Court Justice, [[David Davis (Supreme Court justice)|David Davis]] and local businessman and land holder [[Jesse W. Fell]] whose friend, [[Abraham Lincoln]], was the attorney hired by the board of education to draw up legal documents to secure the school's funding.<ref>Inaugural Meeting of the Board of Regents, Illinois State University, April 1967.</ref><ref name="history">{{cite web |title=Student Enrollment Reports |url=https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiYzU1YWNlNTAtMjQyOC00ZTliLTg3NTEtMGVkODI1ODc0Y2JlIiwidCI6IjA4NWY5ODNhLTBiNjktNDI3MC1iNzFkLTEwNjk1MDc2YmFmZSIsImMiOjN9 |date=July 19, 2011 |access-date=August 14, 2024 |website=Illinois State University}}</ref>

Founded as '''Illinois State Normal University''', it was the first state university in Illinois. Its classes were initially held in downtown [[Bloomington, Illinois|Bloomington]], occupying space in [[Major's Hall]], which was previously the site of Lincoln's "[[Lincoln's Lost Speech|Lost Speech]]." With the completion of Old Main in 1860, the school moved to its current campus in what was then the village of North Bloomington, which was chartered as the town of "Normal" in 1865. The new town had named itself after the university.

The editor of the Bloomington ''Pantagraph'' wrote in 1882: "The intention was to gather around the institution the different colleges, - classical, agricultural, industrial, law medical, and the other departments of a university, - until, in the end, the State should have here a grand university, equal to any."<ref>John Freed, "The Founding of Illinois State Normal University: Normal School or State University?" ''Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society'' (2008) 191#2 pp.106-126 at 107.  [https://www.jstor.org/stable/40204724 online]</ref> Thus the school was originally designed as a wide-ranging university with one department of teacher training. That left only a teacher-training school—indeed what was then called a "[[normal school|normal college]]". It later added many other roles and became a wide-ranging university in the 20th century.<ref>Freed, "The Founding of Illinois State Normal University: Normal School or State University?" pp.106-126.</ref>

On January 1, 1964, the institution's name was changed to '''Illinois State University at Normal''', and then again in 1967 to the current Illinois State University.<ref name=history /> The school's motto was originally "and gladly wold he lerne and gladly teche", in the Middle English spelling of [[Geoffrey Chaucer]]. It has since been updated to modern English in the gender-neutral form "Gladly We Learn and Teach".

The Illinois Board of Higher Education in 2022 approved plans for a new College of Engineering, with the university seeking to add three programs: general engineering, electrical engineering and mechanical engineering.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Wood |first=Connor |date=March 16, 2022 |title=What to know about Illinois State University's new College of Engineering |url=https://pantagraph.com/news/local/education/what-to-know-about-illinois-state-universitys-new-college-of-engineering/article_d6a4eccf-bcc4-505e-a7ad-80e59da35abe.html |access-date=February 20, 2024 |website=pantagraph.com |language=en}}</ref> In January 2023, the university announced that Thomas Keyser would be the first dean of the College of Engineering, which was set to welcome its first students in 2025.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Jacobs |first=Olivia |date=January 13, 2023 |title=Illinois State University names leader for new College of Engineering |url=https://pantagraph.com/news/local/education/illinois-state-university-names-leader-for-new-college-of-engineering/article_e50764e6-9368-11ed-b965-b753aa656e4c.html |access-date=February 20, 2024 |website=pantagraph.com |language=en}}</ref>