North Park has served five generations of students and continues to grow in diversity, academic relevance, and Christian commitment. Our Chicago location is a great asset that reflects the School’s global reach and outlook.
After 125 years, we’ve learned how to streamline the process of helping qualified applicants seek admission to North Park and find affordable ways to attend. If you don’t see what you’re looking for on our website, please contact us directly!
North Park offers more than 40 graduate and undergraduate programs in liberal arts, sciences, and professional studies. Classes average 17 students. 84% of our faculty have terminal degrees. Academics here are rigorous and results-oriented.
North Park Theological Seminary prepares you to answer the call to service through theological study, spiritual development, and the formative experiences of living in a community with others on a similar life path.
The Office of Alumni Engagement fosters lifelong connections by engaging alumni with the university and one another in activities, programs, and services that support the university’s mission and alumni needs.
North Park University’s School of Professional Studies (SPS) will partner with the College of DuPage (COD) in Glen Ellyn in a program that guarantees COD transfer students admission to North Park.
Even before students transfer to North Park, the two schools will collaborate to seamlessly guide students from their associate degree at COD to completing their bachelor’s degrees at North Park.
“This agreement formalizes and elevates an excellent new partnership that gives students of the College of DuPage an opportunity to complete their bachelor’s degrees at North Park University, in the world-class city of Chicago,” said North Park President Mary K. Surridge. “We are delighted to provide this life-changing opportunity for so many students.”
SPS Dean Lori Scrementi said the two schools “hope to create a community of learning for all, not only with fellow students but with faculty and staff, to build a strong, supportive network before, during, and after their time at North Park University.”
Scrementi said that with its integration of Christian, intercultural, and city-centered values, SPS gives students tools for lifelong learning and a strong sense of community-focused decision-making. Faculty and staff bring the wisdom gained from their professions and vocations into their positions at North Park.
COD’s provost, Mark Curtis-Chávez, said the institutional partnership between the schools “reflects our mutual and intentional level of commitment to providing students a clear pathway towards a timely degree in a growing number of academic programs.”
He added: “We look forward to continued collaboration with North Park as we develop new ways to best support students.”
Founded in 1967, the College of DuPage is a community college serving students in Chicago’s western suburbs. Firmly rooted in its community, it is also committed to reflecting the needs and demands of an ever-changing world.
How can you disconnect & reconnect this holiday season? North Park faculty, Dr. Trevor James shares his thoughts.
How can you disconnect & reconnect this holiday season?
“The WIFI is out,” “I think the internet just went down,” “I don’t have any service,” “Can you hear me now?” These are common fears amongst many people in our world today as we strive to stay connected.
As a professor who teaches marketing and digital marketing in the School of Professional Studies at North Park University, I realize that we are dependent on our devices and many of us are connected 24/7. However, what if instead of panicking when the internet goes down, we looked at it as an opportunity? Like when the power goes out and you are forced to sit around a candle or lantern and play a board game, read a book, cuddle up with blankets and actually talk with each other. If you are like me when this happens, I often don’t want the power to come back on. Well, we have that opportunity coming soon, we call them holidays.
In no other time in our history have we been this digitally connected, through social media, texting, and smartphones, we live in an age of constant global connectivity, yet research is showing we are increasingly feeling more alone, and sensing a reduction of human connection. Marian Rose, wrote an article on the Science of Human Connection and Wellness in a Digitally Connected World and states “Psychologists see a pattern in this success-driven culture of busyness and the associated ‘connection disconnection’of an increasingly digitally remote world, and it’s triggering what they say is rapidly becoming a dire epidemic of loneliness . . . it seems that quality personal time for ourselves and for nurturing our relationships has become increasingly more elusive” (M. Rose, 2017).
The question is, though we are digitally and globally connected by investing in this communication, are we actually hurting our personal and human connections?
As a professor, my job is to help my students learn how to create digital content that forces people to pay attention to their digital ads, click on links, and spend as much time connecting to products and services as possible. However, I also teach Digital and Business Ethics and my job is to help students recognize the balance and the importance of communicating face to face and making those human connections. Therefore, I would challenge you this holiday season to focus on each other. To put the phone down, turn the computer off, and let the digital world spin without you for one day. It may allow you to connect with a family or a friend in a unique way and if nothing else, really listen to them and allow you to show them kindness with your ears.
If that doesn’t work, you can always turn off the WIFI router and see what happens. Who knows, you may connect with your friends and family in ways you never thought was possible . . . “Keep calm the internet is off.”
North Park is a city-centered, intercultural, and Christian university located in Chicago. Dr. Trevor James is the associate dean, business faculty and director in the School of Professional Studies. Dr. James teaches a number of classes, such as Marketing, Digital and Social Media Marketing, and Digital/Business Ethics.
The School of Professional Studies offers bachelor’s degree completion programs in business administration, counseling psychology, criminal justice, digital marketing, location intelligence, nonprofit management, and organizational management and leadership. For more information about the School of Professional Studies go to www.northpark.edu/sps.
School’s new name more accurately reflects profile of adult learner
CHICAGO (September 2, 2016) — We’ve heard the metaphor before that life is like a marathon. The finish line is commonly perceived as the ultimate goal, yet the journey we take to get there is important too, and can vary from person to person. For some, speed and making good time is a motivator, while others find themselves having to adjust the pace as life just happens.
Different styles and abilities comprise the pack—the fully charged runner, steady walker, balanced walker-jogger combo, intense sprinter—each as equally goal-oriented as the other. When thinking about post-secondary education and earning a degree, while speed may very well be a factor, at the core is being prepared to advance one’s career with transferable skills and degree in-hand.
Today’s students have a variety of options as they evaluate how to embark on their educational journey, from the traditional four-year path, to fully online, to a hybrid of online and in-classroom. North Park University’s School of Professional Studies, now celebrating its 25th year, is fully committed to offering this group of motivated students a quality education to prepare for the finish line and beyond as they seek career advancement and growth.
North Park has been active in providing programming to degree-seeking adults since 1991, embracing the characteristics of the adult learner. What faculty and staff have learned is that their average 25-and-up adult learner has significant and credit-qualifying life and work experience, and is actively pursuing a particular interest and degree. This student profile is telling, as this fall, North Park has renamed its degree-completion and graduate program the School of Adult Learning as the School of Professional Studies (SPS). “The closer we thought about what an adult learner is, we realized it’s more about the learner as an adult than age itself,” said Dean of the School of Professional Studies Lori Scrementi.
The name change more accurately reflects the full makeup of the SPS, since most of its students transfer to North Park with previous college credit of one kind or another. Flexible options for degree completion such as two quads that start within each of the three semesters, and generous Prior Learning Assessment credit to leverage learning from previous work and other experiences—these are the very ways in which SPS provide a solid foundation to students who are pursuing their degree in a format that suits their lifestyle. “The SPS student thrives in our supportive environment, where they receive personal instruction and advising,” said Associate Director and Assistant Professor Judson Curry.
North Park is a close community, offering support and opportunity to develop personal and professional connections. So adding more services for SPS students reentering a college-level learning environment, like personal advisors, comes naturally to the North Park culture. “From day one, the staff listened to what my goals were and helped me to be successful,” said counseling psychology graduate Cameron Sweeney.
Understanding that various life circumstances brought students to a nontraditional path of earning their degree is foundational to the SPS program, which seeks to meet the interests and demands of the adult learner and continue to add value to their lives.Majors focused on the private, public, and nonprofit sectors are designed to meet the students’ interests and equip them with coveted transferable skills to attract employers and ultimately land in-demand jobs.
SPS instructors hold credentials on par with faculty serving traditional degree-seeking students and often work outside the University within their fields, weaving real-world experience into the classroom. “Many of my professors have worked, or still do, in marketing, so I’m up-to-date on the latest developments,” said business administration graduate Chad Woehrle.
As an inclusive community that engages the city and offers open enrollment to SPS students, the University shares its resources to further enhance the educational experience for SPS students. For instance, the Center for Online Education (COE) is now located in close proximity to SPS offices, to further support the needs of students taking online courses.
SPS graduates have secured jobs in a wide variety of fields, including IT, psychology, and nonprofit management. The proof is in SPS’s success rate of going from degree-completion student to new graduate—more than 56 percent of recent SPS alumni earn their degrees once enrolled, nearly double the average national graduation rate for nontraditional students. “Degree-seeking students are to be celebrated for their dedication to completing their degree, and their success rate is indicative of access to a quality education,” added Scrementi.
Graduation day is one of life’s many marathons—but it’s an important milestone. The SPS faculty and entire learning community at North Park are committed to offering a quality learning experience, so students can get to the finish line feeling strong, believing in themselves, and ready to apply their confidence and skills.
Author Ana SeklerPosted on Categories Press, Stories
In no other time in our history have we been this digitally connected, through social media, texting, and smartphones, we live in an age of constant global connectivity, yet research is showing we are increasingly feeling more alone, and sensing a reduction of human connection. Marian Rose, wrote an article on the Science of Human Connection and Wellness in a Digitally Connected World and states “Psychologists see a pattern in this success-driven culture of busyness and the associated ‘connection disconnection’ of an increasingly digitally remote world, and it’s triggering what they say is rapidly becoming a dire epidemic of loneliness . . . it seems that quality personal time for ourselves and for nurturing our relationships has become increasingly more elusive” (M. Rose, 2017).
North Park is a city-centered, intercultural, and Christian university located in Chicago. Dr. Trevor James is the associate dean, business faculty and director in the School of Professional Studies. Dr. James teaches a number of classes, such as Marketing, Digital and Social Media Marketing, and Digital/Business Ethics.
CHICAGO (September 2, 2016) — We’ve heard the metaphor before that life is like a marathon. The finish line is commonly perceived as the ultimate goal, yet the journey we take to get there is important too, and can vary from person to person. For some, speed and making good time is a motivator, while others find themselves having to adjust the pace as life just happens.
North Park is a close community, offering support and opportunity to develop personal and professional connections. So adding more services for SPS students reentering a college-level learning environment, like personal advisors, comes naturally to the North Park culture. “From day one, the staff listened to what my goals were and helped me to be successful,” said 