The Big Picture: Incoming Illini
Move-In Day—a rite of passage for U. of I. undergrads marked by hope and excitement, but also scorching heat, interminable traffic, and mounting concern that the experience will never end.
Illini 411: Did an Illinois student pay his tuition with pennies?
A: Yes! Sort of. In the summer of 1987, incoming freshman Mike Hayes worried about how to pay for his education, until he got an oddball idea. He asked the
My Alma Mater: High Honors
Thank god for the HoHo. Thank god for that rickety, wooden house on Oregon Street, which kept me in school and gave me friends, love, education, and a great place
Memory Lane: Summertime, and the livin’ is easy
It’s a truism that the Illinois campus empties out during the summer months, but every year there are thousands of students who decide to stay put, whether it’s for a
Great Sports Moments: A Perfect Season
Northern schools—Illinois fits that category—are not supposed to be good at tennis. Climate is the biggest issue: It’s hard to practice your serve and volley with a foot of snow
Memory Lane: The Flooding of Green Street
Today, Boneyard Creek is one of the most beautiful features of the Illinois campus, but for more than a century, it was a trash-filled eyesore with a drainage problem, and
Illini 411: Why did the U. of I. not have a Commencement speaker from 1976 to 1983?
A: By the mid-1970s, the class sizes at Illinois were enormous, and the campus-wide Commencement ceremonies, then held at the Assembly Hall, had grown uncomfortably long. In 1976, organizers decided
My Alma Mater: Press Corps
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) was all smiles, looking at the PBS cameras, checking her mic, and making final preparations for that night’s debate. “Who’s playing my husband?” she joked, as
Illini 411: When did we start dressing up Alma Mater?
A: In 2005, during the men’s basketball team’s Final Four season, a group of unknown students dressed Alma in a whopper of an orange jersey, complete with a matching headband.
Welcome Back
Walk into the Alice Campbell Alumni Center from any direction, and you can’t miss them: the dozens of interactive cases, tables, panels, and more that make up the U. of
