Trinity Washington University
Trinity Washington University
Main page

Trinity Washington University

logo
Community Hub0 subscribers
What are your thoughts?
Be the first to start a discussion here.
Be the first to start a discussion here.
Trinity Washington University

Trinity Washington University is a private Catholic university in Washington, D.C., United States. It was founded as Trinity College by the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur in 1897 as the nation's first Catholic liberal arts college for women. Trinity was chartered by an Act of Congress on August 20, 1897. An elite collegian institution in its early life, the college faced declining enrollment by the 1980s. It began recruiting local underprivileged students. It was renamed Trinity Washington University in 2004.

Trinity enrolls more than 1,800 students in its undergraduate and graduate programs in the College of Arts and Sciences, School of Nursing and Health Professions, School of Education, School of Business and Graduate Studies, and School of Professional Studies. Trinity's student body in 2020 includes about 95% ethnic minorities, including about 65% Black/African American and 30% Latino/Hispanic. Trinity is designated by the U.S. Department of Education as a Minority Serving Institution and is the only university in the D.C. region, as well as one of only a few in the nation, designated as both a Predominantly Black Institution (PBI) and Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI). Trinity has a 97% acceptance rate, with 35% of students graduating.

After its founding in 1897 as the nation's first Catholic liberal arts college for women by the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, Trinity educated middle-class Catholic women, who were underrepresented in America's colleges, for more than 70 years. (For more background on women's higher education, see Origins and types of Women's colleges in the United States.)

When many all-male colleges became co-ed, Trinity's full-time enrollment dropped from 1,000 in 1969 to 300 in 1989. The school's 12th president, Donna Jurick, responded in the early 1980s by opening a weekend college for working women from the District of Columbia, a racially diverse population the school had previously not served. The first such program in Washington, it became very popular; within three years, it had more students than the undergraduate program.

Under Patricia McGuire, a Trinity alumna who became college president in 1989, Trinity reached out to the Black and Hispanic women of Washington. McGuire split the college into three schools. The historic women's college became the College of Arts and Sciences; the higher-revenue teacher college became the School of Education; and the continuing education classes were folded into a School of Professional Studies. Trinity began recruiting at D.C. high schools and expanded the professional schools, whose combined enrollment rose from 639 in 1989 to 974 in 1999.

In 2004, the college gained university status and became Trinity Washington University.

Trinity has an annual enrollment of more than 1,800 students in the university's five schools, which offer undergraduate and graduate degrees.

Trinity offers professional programs at a satellite classroom located at THEARC, a multipurpose community facility in Southeast Washington — the only private university to offer college degree programs in the District of Columbia's underserved neighborhoods east of the Anacostia River.

See all
User Avatar
No comments yet.