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List of women's universities and colleges in the United States

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Billings Hall at Wellesley College
Wellesley College in Massachusetts

The following is a list of women's colleges in the United States, organized by state. These are institutions of higher education in the United States whose student populations are composed exclusively or almost exclusively of women. There are approximately sixty active women's colleges in the U.S., most commonly liberal arts colleges.

Currently active women's colleges are listed in bold text. Colleges that are closed are listed in italics. Former women's colleges that are now coeducational are listed in plain text.

Alabama

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Arkansas

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California

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Scripps College in Claremont (view as a 360° interactive panorama)

Colorado

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Connecticut

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District of Columbia

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Florida

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Georgia

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Agnes Scott College

Illinois

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Indiana

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Iowa

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Kansas

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Kentucky

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  • Green River Academy (started in 1834 by the Cumberland Presbytery), now a museum run by the Green River Academy Preservation Society.
  • Beaumont College, Kentucky (closed in 1917)
  • Bethel College, Russellville (co-ed in 1951; closed in 1964)
  • Brescia University, Owensboro (established co-ed Owensboro branch in 1925; became co-ed in 1950 when branches merged)
  • Caldwell Female College, Danville, Kentucky, was originally chartered as the Henderson Female Institute in 1854; changed its name in 1860 to honor the principle donor, Charles Caldwell. In 1913, it consolidated with the Princeton Collegiate Institute and became the Kentucky College for Women (see more on this below).
  • Campbell–Hagerman College, Lexington (founded in 1903; closed in 1912)
  • Cedar Bluff College, Woodburn (closed in 1892)
  • Clinton College, Clinton (co-ed in 1876; closed in 1915)
  • Elizabethtown Female Academy, Elizabethtown, incorporated in 1848,[5] grew out of the boys-only Hardin Academy, established in 1806.[6]
  • Georgetown Female College, Georgetown (merged with Georgetown College in 1893)
  • Hamilton College, Lexington was founded in 1869 as Hocker Female College. a private women's college affiliated with the Disciples of Christ. Its name changed in 1878. In 1889, Kentucky University (later Transylvania University), bought a stake in the school, taking total control in 1903. Closed in 1932.
  • John Lyle's Female Seminary (founded in 1806)[2]
  • Kentucky College for Young Ladies, Pewee Valley, was chartered and opened in 1874. Boys were allowed for day classes in 1896. Destroyed by fired at the end of the century.
  • Kentucky College for Women, Danville, formerly Caldwell Female College, merged with Centre College in 1926 (as the women's department) but did not formally consolidate with Centre until 1930. Women students didn't move to the Centre campus until 1962.
  • Lexington Female College, Lexington, Kentucky[7]
  • Logan Female College, Russellville (closed in 1931)
  • Lynnland Female Institute or Lynnland Female College, Glendale, Kentucky started in 1867 In the 1870s, it became co-educational as the Lynnland Military Institution with the women taught in a separate department. Closed in 1879. By 1888, the school returned to its former status as a college for women and renamed Lynnland Female College. After the 1914–15 academic term, Lynnland was sold and became the site of an orphanage.
  • Midway University, Midway (co-ed since 2016, though it had admitted male evening, weekend, and online students earlier)
  • Millersburg Female College started first as a Female Collegiate Institute in Georgetown in 1837, affiliated with the Disciples of Christ Through the 1850s it was coeducational. In February 1860 the state granted a charter to the Millersburg Female College, and in June 1867 it graduated its first class of four women. In 1915, it was renamed Millersburg College and in 1931 the nearby Millersburg Military Institute purchased it for elementary school for its junior cadets. College and a normal department was established in 1862.
  • Nazareth Academy, Nelson County/ Founded in 1814 by the Catholic Sisters of Charity of Nazareth; moved from its original site outside of Bardstown to Nazareth in 1822. Received authority to grant degrees in 1829; later designated as a college. For further history, see Spalding College below.
  • Owensboro Female College opened in the fall of 1890 and chartered on March 26, 1893, to offer literary degrees: mistress of arts and mistress of belles-lettres. By 1931 the building was taken over by the Owensboro Trade School, and in 1939 the building was demolished in favor of a new building.
  • Pleasant J. Potter College, Bowling Green (closed in 1909)
  • Sayre Female Institute, Lexington was founded in November 1854 as the Transylvania Female Seminary. In 1855, name changed to the Sayre Female Institute, and the state granted its charter in 1856 to confer collegiate degrees. Became co-ed after World War I and became a college preparatory school in 1962. See the National Register nomination form for more details.
  • Spalding College, Louisville. Founded in 1920 by the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth as the Louisville campus of Nazareth College. Instruction continued at both locations until 1971, when all instruction was moved to Louisville. The school became Spalding College in 1969, and became coeducational in 1973. It adopted its current name of Spalding University in 1984.
  • St. Catharine College, Springfield (co-ed in 1951; closed in 2016)
  • Stanford Female College, Stanford (closed in 1907)
  • Ursuline College, Louisville (merged into Bellarmine College in 1968)
  • Villa Madonna College, Covington, was founded in 1921 as a women's college by the Benedictine Sisters of Covington and chartered by the state in 1923. It ran coeducational classes through an affiliation with the all-male St. Thomas More College. In 1945, Villa Madonna became coeducational and St. Thomas More was abolished. The school changed its name to Thomas More College in 1968, the same year it moved to its current campus in Crestview Hills, and adopted its current name of Thomas More University in 2018.

Louisiana

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Maine

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Maryland

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Massachusetts

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Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley

Michigan

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Minnesota

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Mississippi

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Missouri

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Nebraska

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New Hampshire

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New Jersey

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New York

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Barnard College in Manhattan

North Carolina

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North Dakota

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Ohio

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Oklahoma

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Oregon

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Pennsylvania

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Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr

Rhode Island

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South Carolina

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South Dakota

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Tennessee

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Texas

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Utah

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Vermont

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Virginia

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Sweet Briar College, Sweet Briar

Washington

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West Virginia

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Wisconsin

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Encyclopedia of Alabama article". Encyclopedia of Alabama article. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Kristen Welch; Abraham Ruelas (2015). The Role of Female Seminaries on the Road to Social Justice for Women. Wipf and Stock. p. 53. ISBN 9781620325636.
  3. ^ Steiger's Educational Directory. 1878 Edition. E. Steiger. 1878. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  4. ^ Seibert, David. "Hamilton Female College". GeorgiaInfo: an Online Georgia Almanac. Digital Library of Georgia. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
  5. ^ Acts of the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Frankfort: A.G. Hodges & Co. 1848. p. 421.
  6. ^ "This History of Hardin County". Hardin County History Museum. Archived from the original on 11 April 2021. Retrieved 12 March 2021.
  7. ^ "Catalogue of the Lexington Female College, Lexington, Ky., for 1878-'79". Kentucky Historical Society Digital Collections. Archived from the original on 10 Apr 2013. Retrieved January 17, 2024.
  8. ^ "Woman's Medical College of Baltimore Permanently Closed". Journal of the American Medical Association. LIV (24): 1950. 1910. doi:10.1001/jama.1910.02550500036020.
  9. ^ "Woman's Medical College of Baltimore". 2 June 2018.
  10. ^ Wong, Alia (June 18, 2019). "The Surreal End of an American College". The Atlantic. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
  11. ^ "City of Lansing page on Michigan Female College". Lansingmi.gov. Archived from the original on March 14, 2012. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  12. ^ Steiger's Educational Directory 1878 Edition. E. Steiger. 1878. p. 27. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  13. ^ "Whitworth College Archive with complete list of functions of school". Llf.lib.ms.us. Archived from the original on March 17, 2012. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  14. ^ Forbes, Tina (September 14, 2016). "SNHU to continue academics, employment for Daniel Webster College students and staff". Nashua Telegraph. Retrieved July 27, 2017.
  15. ^ "1867 post card about MFC". Docsouth.unc.edu. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  16. ^ "historic marker about Wesleyan Female". Ncmarkers.com. September 12, 1974. Archived from the original on February 16, 2012. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  17. ^ "OCLA," Archived 2016-01-19 at the Wayback Machine University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma, Accessed August 31, 2015.
  18. ^ "Becoming USAO," Archived 2015-09-07 at the Wayback Machine University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma, Accessed August 31, 2015.
  19. ^ "article on Cumberland Female College". Cumberland.org. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  20. ^ "Charnwood Institute".
  21. ^ "postcard mentioning Mary Connor Female College". Texashistory.unt.edu. July 7, 2012. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  22. ^ "article from site on old Virginia architecture". Vahistorical.org. Archived from the original on September 23, 2012. Retrieved July 20, 2012.
  23. ^ a b "Alderson Broaddus University". Archived from the original on June 24, 2013. Retrieved March 14, 2013.
  24. ^ "Greenbrier College for Women". Archived from the original on June 24, 2013. Retrieved March 14, 2013.

Further reading

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