Shimer College, a small liberal arts school in Waukegan, has been awarded more than $200,000 by the National Endowment for the Humanities, federal officials announced this week.
Shimer, a school that has developed its curriculum around the ”great books,” including the writings of Newton and Einstein, was one of 36 educational and cultural institutions around the nation that will share $13.8 million in grants, federal officials said Wednesday. It was the only recipient from Illinois.
Officials of the National Endowment, a federal agency, said the awardees, which included Cornell University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the New England Foundation for Humanities in Boston and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, have been asked to raise $3 to $4 in matching funds for every federal dollar offered.
The agency said it anticipates non-federal sources to contribute about $50 million to the fund.
Don Moon, president of Shimer, which has an enrollment of 85 students and a faculty of 12, said the college has been awarded $246,000.
”I feel very good about it,” Moon said Wednesday afternoon. ”It`s a wonderful thing for Shimer. It shows the excellence in education Shimer exhibits.”
Moon said the money will be used for faculty development and endowment and the retirement of debts. He said the school will be able to draw on the money immediately because it has already raised a third of the necessary matching funds.
Shimer was founded in 1853. Its home was in Mt. Carroll until 1979, when it was moved to Waukegan.
