A new master’s program in plant biology and conservation, set to begin next fall, will be one of several new connections between Northwestern and the Chicago Botanic Garden, located in Glencoe, Ill.
The Integrated Program in Plant Biology and Conservation, the first master’s program in these fields in the nation, will train students in botanical science through classes including biology, ecology, geology and anthropology.
Classes will be held both at NU and at the Garden and are scheduled to begin in September 2005.
“This partnership with Northwestern will allow us to train future scientists in botany and conservation,” said Kris Jarantoski, executive vice president and director of the Chicago Botanic Garden.
The new program is one example of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences teaming up with the Garden to develop opportunities of interaction for both graduate and undergraduate students.
Weinberg Dean Daniel Linzer said this relationship allows NU to take advantage of its proximity to Chicago-area establishments.
“We have an incredibly rich opportunity to offer tremendous educational opportunities because we’re so close to major world-class institutions,” Linzer said.
Searches currently are under way to fill three staff positions following the master’s program’s creation.
One will be a joint budgetary appointment for undergraduate teaching and research in Weinberg, and a second joint position will focus on developing the program between NU and the garden. The third role will be for a plant ecologist who would teach as an adjunct faculty member in the master’s program.
Linzer said he sees four levels of interaction between the college and the Garden. At the undergraduate level, the joint faculty member will act as a liaison to the Garden working to develop research and interaction for undergraduates.
The graduate faculty appointment will assist with the joint graduate program in plant biology and conservation.
The relationship between the master’s program and the undergraduate environmental sciences program will allow for more interaction between graduate and undergraduate students, Linzer said.
“We don’t want to a stand-alone project. It has to tie into our academic mission,” Linzer said. “There’s a direct fit of the master’s program with environmental science students.”
The partnership also will strengthen faculty collaborations between NU and the Garden because it “complements what we have at Northwestern and allows researchers to do better work,” Linzer said.
The fourth level of interaction focuses on alumni involvement, Linzer said. The Garden’s relationship to the college will open up more opportunities for alumni to help the Garden and stay involved.
But Weinberg’s connection to Chicago-area institutions expands beyond the Chicago Botanic Garden.
Courses at the Field Museum already are available to NU students, and several Chicago institutions offer internships.
Michael Smutko, a Weinberg lecturer in physics and astronomy who works as an astronomer at the Adler Planetarium, said both the college and the Chicago institutions benefit in these partnerships.
“The Adler (Planetarium) benefits by having access to Northwestern faculty,” Smutko said. He added that, in turn, NU “has access to this very large network that Adler has established in the world of educators.”
Reach Angela Tablac at [email protected].
