Marywood University

Marywood University is a co-educational, Catholic liberal arts university located on a 115-acre (0.47 km²) campus in Scranton, Pennsylvania, USA within the Diocese of Scranton. Established in 1915 by the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Marywood currently enrolls more than 3,400 students in a variety of undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral programs. The university has a national arboretum with more than 100 types of trees and shrubs. Marywood's Catholic identity coupled with its mission to educate students to "live responsibility in an interdependent world" encourages students to be socially responsible agents of change.

History

The Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary came to Scranton, Pennsylvania and established St. Cecilia's Academy in 1878 "for young ladies". Mount St. Mary's Seminary opened in 1902. Mother Cyril Conroy, superior in 1901, deliberately chose the term "seminary" (roughly equivalent to a high school in present times) to avoid the suggestion of a finishing school – which was a much more common destination at that time for older girls who could afford to continue their education – as it was intended to be "a place where young scholars dedicated themselves to serious study". The Motherhouse was co-located with the seminary. Its buildings suffered major damage during a fire in the 1970s. As a result, Scranton Preparatory School, then a boys' school, became co-educational to accommodate the girls. The arch, now known as "Memorial Arch", which stood at the entrance to the seminary-cum-motherhouse still stands on the present-day campus and the former seminary's name can be seen engraved on it.

University

A university (Latin: universitas, "a whole") is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which grants academic degrees in various subjects and typically provides undergraduate education and postgraduate education. The word "university" is derived from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium, which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars."

History

Definition

The original Latin word "universitas" refers in general to "a number of persons associated into one body, a society, company, community, guild, corporation, etc." At the time of the emergence of urban town life and medieval guilds, specialised "associations of students and teachers with collective legal rights usually guaranteed by charters issued by princes, prelates, or the towns in which they were located" came to be denominated by this general term. Like other guilds, they were self-regulating and determined the qualifications of their members.

In modern usage the word has come to mean "An institution of higher education offering tuition in mainly non-vocational subjects and typically having the power to confer degrees," with the earlier emphasis on its corporate organization considered as applying historically to Medieval universities.