Illinois

Illinois (ⁱ/ˌɪlᵻˈnɔɪ/ IL-i-NOY) is a state in the midwestern region of the United States. It is the 5th most populous state and 25th largest state in terms of land area, and is often noted as a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal, timber, and petroleum in the south, Illinois has a diverse economic base and is a major transportation hub. The Port of Chicago connects the state to other global ports from the Great Lakes, via the Saint Lawrence Seaway, to the Atlantic Ocean, as well as the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River, via the Illinois River. For decades, O'Hare International Airport has been ranked as one of the world's busiest airports. Illinois has long had a reputation as a bellwether both in social and cultural terms and politics.

Although today the state's largest population center is around Chicago in the northern part of the state, the state's European population grew first in the west, with French Canadians who settled along the Mississippi River, and gave the area the name, Illinois. After the American Revolutionary War established the United States, American settlers began arriving from Kentucky in the 1810s via the Ohio River, and the population grew from south to north. In 1818, Illinois achieved statehood. After construction of the Erie Canal increased traffic and trade through the Great Lakes, Chicago was founded in the 1830s on the banks of the Chicago River, at one of the few natural harbors on southern Lake Michigan.John Deere's invention of the self-scouring steel plow turned Illinois' rich prairie into some of the world's most productive and valuable farmlands, attracting immigrant farmers from Germany and Sweden. Railroads carried immigrants to new homes, as well as being used to ship their commodity crops out to markets.

Team

A team is a group of people or other animals linked in a common purpose. Human teams are especially appropriate for conducting tasks that are high in complexity and have many interdependent subtasks.

A group does not necessarily constitute a team. Teams normally have members with complementary skills and generate synergy through a coordinated effort which allows each member to maximize their strengths and minimize their weaknesses. Naresh Jain (2009) claims:

Team members need to learn how to help one another, help other team members realize their true potential, and create an environment that allows everyone to go beyond his or her limitations. Teams can be broken down into from a huge team or one big group of people, even if these smaller secondary teams are temporary.

A team becomes more than just a collection of people when a strong sense of mutual commitment creates synergy, thus generating performance greater than the sum of the performance of its individual members.

Thus teams of game players can form (and re-form) to practise their craft/sport. Transport logistics executives can select teams of horses, dogs, or oxen for the purpose of conveying passengers or goods.

Illinois Fighting Illini

The Fighting Illini (IPA /ɪ.laɪ.naɪ/) are the intercollegiate athletic teams of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The university offers 10 men's and 11 women's varsity sports.

The University operates a number of athletic facilities, including Memorial Stadium for football, the State Farm Center for both men's and women's basketball, the Atkins Tennis Center for men's and women's tennis, and Huff Hall for the women's, the men's wrestling, and the men's teams. The Fighting Illini lay claim to over twenty-five National Championships dating back to 1900.

Conference and affiliations

The University's Division of Intercollegiate Athletics administers the official athletics teams of the University. All of the University's athletics teams participate in the NCAA's Division I, and form the Big Ten Conference with 13 other primarily midwestern universities. The football team participates in a subdivision within the Division I known as the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS).

University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign

The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign (U of I, University of Illinois, UIUC, or simply Illinois) is a public research-intensive university in the U.S. state of Illinois. A land-grant university, it is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system. The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign (founded, 1867) is the second oldest public university in the state (after Illinois State University), and is a founding member of the Big Ten Conference. It is a member of the Association of American Universities and is designated as a RU/VH Research University (very high research activities). The campus library system possesses the second-largest university library in the United States after Harvard University.

The university comprises 17 colleges that offer more than 150 programs of study. Additionally, the university operates an extension that serves 2.7 million registrants per year around the state of Illinois and beyond. The campus holds 647 buildings on 4,552 acres (1,842 ha) in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana (together known as Champaign–Urbana); its annual operating budget in 2011 was over $1.7 billion.

Illinois State University

Illinois State University (ISU), founded in 1857, is the oldest public university in Illinois, United States; it is located in the town of Normal. ISU grants a variety of bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees and emphasizes teaching. The university fosters faculty research and has active researchers, many of whom encourage the participation of students. ISU is also recognized as one of the top ten largest producers of teachers in the US according to the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education. The ISU athletic teams are members of the Missouri Valley Conference and the Missouri Valley Football Conference and are known as the "Redbirds," in reference to the state bird, the cardinal.

Location

Illinois State University's campus is in the twin-city community of Bloomington-Normal near the geographic center of the state, 137 miles southwest of Chicago and 164 miles northeast of St. Louis. Interstates 74, 55, and 39; U.S. Route 150; and Illinois Route 9 intersect around Bloomington-Normal, creating a transportation hub. An Amtrak passenger station is just two blocks from the University.