The ESF-SU Relationship
The intimacy of a small, specialized college with all the benefits of a large university is what ESF students enjoy thanks to a longstanding partnership with neighboring Syracuse University.
ESF students have many of the same opportunities and privileges as SU students, through this unique partnership, which encompasses everything related to college life — housing, dining, academics, clubs, activities and study abroad — and dates back to the founding of the College in 1911.
ESF students can avail themselves to a variety of academic options at SU to supplement their ESF education. Special access to courses at SU enables our students to take classes in such areas as marketing, entrepreneurship and management studies, and liberal arts. Our students may also use SU’s extensive libraries and computer labs to supplement those on the ESF campus.
A world of opportunity is available to ESF students through SU Abroad, the university’s international studies program. The program allows students to customize an international experience that meets their linguistic needs, and professional and personal goals.
ESF freshmen live on common floors in SU residence halls while taking common sections of lower-division courses as part of the ESF Learning Community program. They can eat in any of SU’s five residential dining halls and the on-campus food court.
Outside the academic realm, the ESF/SU relationship provides students with the complete gambit of activities and sports. Students can join any of the 300 extracurricular SU clubs or activities from the marching band that performs during football games, to the Sour Citrus Society that serves as the pep band for the basketball team, to drama and musical groups, to sports clubs such as hockey or soccer. ESF students can’t participate in SU’s Division I NCAA sports, however that doesn’t mean our students don’t get in on the action.
On The Hill, the seasons are divided in three — football, basketball and lacrosse — giving our student body plenty of opportunity to cheer the Orange on to victory in the Carrier Dome (located right across the street from ESF’s Illick Hall).
At the end of four years, ESF and SU share joint commencement ceremonies in the Dome, and ESF graduates receive a diploma that proudly carries the Syracuse University seal alongside the seal of the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry.
