Cheyney University of Pennsylvania

Cheyney University of Pennsylvania is a public, co-educational historically black university that is a part of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE). Cheyney University has a 275-acre (1.11 km²) campus that is located in the Cheyney community within Thornbury Township, Chester County and Thornbury Township, Delaware County in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. Cheyney University is a member-school of Thurgood Marshall College Fund. The university offers bachelor's and master's degrees. In November 2015, the Middle States Commission on Higher Education placed Cheyney University on probation. Administrators are required to address a variety of issues including finances, leadership, and assessment of learning.

History

Founded as the African Institute in February 1837 and renamed the Institute of Colored Youth (ICY) in April 1837, Cheyney University is the oldest African-American institution of higher learning.

Unlike Lincoln University and some others HBCUs, Cheyney did not award degrees until 1914, when it adopted the curriculum of a normal school (teacher training). The African Institute was founded by Richard Humphreys, a Quaker philanthropist who bequeathed $10,000, one-tenth of his estate, to design and establish a school to educate people of African descent and prepare them as teachers.

Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania ⁱ/ˌpɛnsᵻlˈveɪnjə/ (Pennsylvania German: Pennsilfaani), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state located in the northern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The Appalachian Mountains run through its middle. The state borders Delaware to the southeast, Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, Lake Erie and the Canadian province of Ontario to the northwest, New York to the north, and New Jersey to the east.

Pennsylvania is the 33rd largest, the 6th most populous, and the 9th most densely populated of the 50 United States. The state's five most populous cities are Philadelphia (1,560,297), Pittsburgh (305,801), Allentown (118,577), Erie (100,671), and Reading (89,893). The state capital is Harrisburg. Pennsylvania has 51 miles (82 km) of coastline along Lake Erie and 57 miles (92 km) of shoreline along the Delaware Estuary.

The state is one of the 13 original founding states of the United States; it was originally founded in 1681 as a result of a royal land grant to William Penn, the son of the state's namesake. It was the second state to ratify the United States Constitution, on December 12, 1787. Independence Hall, where the United States Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution were drafted, is located in the state's largest city of Philadelphia. During the American Civil War, the Battle of Gettysburg was fought in the south central region of the state.