Naperville's North Central College acquiring Shimer College

North Central College in Naperville is set to grow with the acquisition announced Thursday of Shimer College in Chicago.

Officials said the two colleges have come to an understanding with plans for North Central to acquire and integrate the faculty, programs and students of Shimer effective beginning with the fall 2017 term.

Shimer College is based on the campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, where it offers one major with three tracks: Humanities, social sciences and natural sciences.

In the acquisition plan with North Central, the Naperville college would create a Shimer Great Books School to incorporate the Shimer curriculum, which focuses on "primary source texts and small, student-led discussion courses," according to a news release.

The acquisition is expected to become final in March.

Shimer students would join the roughly 2,900 at North Central, a private liberal arts school founded in 1861. Under President Troy D. Hammond, North Central is building a new dorm and a $60 million science center on its campus in the historic district near downtown Naperville.