History

The story of William Rainey Harper College parallels the history of the community college movement in Illinois, an educational phenomenon in the late 1960s.

Late in 1964, while legislators in Springfield were adding the final revisions to the Illinois Community College Act enabling citizens to form their own college districts, concerned citizens in Chicago's northwest suburban communities petitioned for a referendum to vote on the establishment of a college. Within a matter of days after the legislation passed, voters in the four-township area of Elk Grove, Palatine, Schaumburg and Wheeling approved a referendum establishing the Harper district - on March 27, 1965.

Groundwork for the referendum to establish a two-year college had been laid early in the 1960s with a survey of student needs and the establishment of a concerned Citizen's Committee. The success of the committee was exhibited in a 3-2 margin at the polls. Voters returned to the polls 34 days after approving the referendum to elect seven citizens, from among 48 candidates, as the first board of the new college.

Two years later, Barrington School District 224 (now Unit School District 220) annexed to the Harper district, and the boundaries of Harper's 200-square-mile-constituency were established to become Illinois Community College District 512.

Since its inception, Harper College has been most fortunate in having trustees possessing the capacity to work together in planning programs, solving problems and establishing goals unique in the annals of the northwest suburbs. The first board meeting was held in May, 1965. The College had no name, no staff and no facilities, but it did have seven dedicated individuals determined to establish a community college worthy of the area it serves.

During the first year, a president was hired, architects were selected to design and plan a campus, the campus site was chosen and a decision was made to adopt the name of William Rainey Harper College in honor of the "father" of the two-year-college concept.

Voters in the district approved a $7,375,000 building referendum 4-1 to begin Harper's second year. By September, 1967, the College was staffed and operating with more than 1,700 students attending evening classes in Elk Grove High School, and ground had been broken for a new campus. Harper College was a reality, and the northwest suburbs had the first college in a 125-year history.

Harper serves as a cornerstone in Illinois educational history as the first two-year institution to complete Phase I of its building construction and the first to receive unqualified full accreditation - only six years after its founding - in the shortest possible time in 1971.

Throughout its brief history, Harper has had a record of monumental growth. The 1967 enrollment of about 1700 students jumped to 3,700 in one year, double the projections. When the doors opened on Harper's new campus in fall, 1969, approximately 5400 students were enrolled.

The College employed numerous off-campus locations, instituted a Weekend College program, and opened an extension campus at Willow Park Center in 1975 to provide additional classroom space for day and evening offerings. The Northeast Center subsequently moved to the Hawthorne School in Wheeling, and in the fall of 1982, to the Stevenson School in Prospect Heights.

A successful referendum held in September, 1975 provided funds for the College to proceed with completion of the present campus, purchase land for a second site, and construct the first phase of buildings on that site when required by enrollment increases.

Buildings G and H, the Engineering and Applied Technology Center, were completed and classes begun in the facilities in 1977. Building M, the physical education, athletics and recreation facility, and Buildings I and J, the Business and Social Science Center, opened to classes in the 1979-80 academic year. All plans were subject to approval by the Illinois Community College Board and the Illinois Board of Higher Education.

In 1982, the College established a training center in cooperation with high technology firms in the area. The center was designed to provide instruction and resource materials relating to computer aided design and manufacturing. The innovative educational program of the CAD Center was structured to assist high technology firms in training their employees, as well as to provide some instruction in this developing technology to students in Harper programs. In 1986, the CAD Center was relocated from a Schaumburg office to Building H at the campus.

In February 1985, residents of the college district approved a tax rate increase for operation of the College. This was the first increase in tax support for the educational programs, services and operating expenses of Harper College in the 20 years since the College was established.

Changes in population trends over the past 10 years indicated that a second campus would not be needed to accommodate projected enrollment, and the decision was made to sell the property which had been purchased in Arlington Heights. The sale was finalized in 1986.

In August, 1993, the College opened Building S which houses the Marketing Services Department. In the spring of 1994, Building L, the Liberal Arts Building was opened. This building includes the Liberal Arts division office, classrooms and faculty offices as well as the College Bookstore. First floor space includes a "black box" theatre for instructional use and three-dimensional art studios devoted to ceramics, sculpture, stagecraft and metal work. The two buildings were part of a building phase that also includes renovation plans in existing buildings. Renovations completed in 1996 included the addition of a large computer lab in the Business and Social Science Center and updating of the Plant Science Center.