Mississippi University for Women, also known as MUW or simply the "W" is a four-year coeducational public university located in Columbus, Mississippi. It was formerly known as Industrial Institute and College (II&C) and later Mississippi State College for Women (MSCW). Men have been offered admission to MUW since 1982.
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History and mission
Upon its establishment in 1884, Mississippi University for Women became the first public women's college in the United States. Then formally titled the Industrial Institute and College for the Education of White Girls, the institution was created by an act of the Mississippi Legislature on March 12, 1884, for the dual purposes of providing a liberal arts education for women and preparing them for employment. The first session began October 22, 1885, with an enrollment of approximately 250 students on a campus formerly occupied by the Columbus Female Institute, a private college founded in 1847.
The name of the institution changed to Mississippi State College for Women in 1920 to reflect an emphasis on collegiate, rather than vocational, education. In 1971 Mississippi State College for Women won the intercollegiate women's basketball national championship (the third ever held).
In 1974 the name was changed to the Mississippi University for Women to reflect the expanded academic programs, including graduate studies. All other Mississippi state colleges were also designated universities at this time.
In 1982, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the case of Mississippi University for Women v. Hogan that the nursing school's single-sex admissions policies were in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Following this decision, the Board of Trustees of State Institutions of Higher Learning ordered the university to change its policies to allow the admission of qualified males into all university programs. In 1988, the Board of Trustees reaffirmed the mission of MUW as an institution providing quality academic programs for all qualified students, with emphasis on distinctive opportunities for women.
In a 1997 article in Innovative Higher Education, the journalist Dale Thorn describes MUW's successful attempt to avoid a merger with another institution and to remain a separate entity.
In 2009, then university president, Dr. Claudia Limbert, announced the possibility of changing the university's name to Reneau University. The Mississippi State legislature did not approve the change.
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Academics
The University offers academic programs in more than 50 areas of study.
In 2006 MUW awarded 481 undergraduate degrees. The following were the top ten degrees awarded and the percentage of the graduates that came from that program:
- Nursing 16%
- Elementary Education 10%
- Psychology 6%
- Business Administration and Management 5%
- Visual and Performing Arts 5%
- Family Systems 4%
- Accounting 4%
- Paralegal 3%
- Social Sciences 3%
- English 3%
The remaining degrees awarded were in the following subjects: Art Education, Biology, Chemistry, Communication, Culinary Arts, Graphic Design, Interior Design, Studio Arts, Theatre, History, Health & Kinesiology, Exercise Science, Sport Management, Mathematics, Microbiology, Music, Physical Science, Political Science, Spanish, Speech-Language Pathology /Audiology and Pre-professional degrees. MUW offers Pre-Professional degrees in Pre-Dentistry, Pre-Engineering, Pre-Law, Pre-Medical Technology, Pre-Medicine, Pre-Occupational Therapy, Pre-Pharmacy, Pre-Physical Therapy, and Pre-Veterinary.
In 2006 MUW awarded 81 Master's degrees from its eight different graduate programs. The following are the percentages of graduates that came from each program:
- Master of Science in Nursing 43%
- Master of Science in Speech-Language Pathology 17%
- Master of Education in Reading/Literacy 17%
- Master of Science in Health education 12%
- Master of Education in Differentiated Instruction 4%
- Master of Education in Gifted Studies 4%
- Master of Arts in Teaching 2%
Campus demographics
Student organizations: Brotherhood of Beta Kappa Tau, Xi Delta Omega
Students
Total Enrollment: 2428
- Total Undergraduate Enrollment: 2280
- Total Graduate Enrollment: 148
Freshman: 587 Sophomores: 353 Juniors: 487 Seniors: 834 Graduate Students: 148
Faculty
Average Faculty Salary: $46,184 Student to Faculty Ratio: 12 to 1
Total Faculty: 207
- Administrative: 9
- Full-Time Faculty: 132
- Part-Time Faculty: 66
- Male Full-Time Faculty: 49
- Female Full-Time Faculty: 83
Faculty Rank
- Professor: 30
- Associate Professor: 16
- Assistant Professor: 35
- Instructor: 51
Student demographics 2006-2007
Average Age of Students: 25
Female: 79% Male: 21%
Full-time: 83% Part-time 17%
White: 64% Black: 32% Other: 4%
Mississippi Resident: 91.56% Other United State Resident: 7.66% International: 0.78%
Freshman admissions
Number of freshman applicants: 1381 Number of freshman admitted: 683
ACT minimum score: 16 ACT mean score: 21.5
Colleges and schools
Business
MUW's College of Business is accredited by the Association of Collegiate Business Schools and Programs. Business majors in the 2006-2007 school year represented 8% of the total MUW student body
Education and Human Sciences
The MUW College of Education and Human Sciences is divided into three departments, the Department of Education, the Department of Psychology and Family Studies, and the Department of Health & Kinesiology.
Nursing and Speech Language Pathology
The MUW College of Nursing and Speech Language Pathology offers undergraduate and master's degrees.
Arts and Sciences
The MUW College of Arts and Sciences is divided into six departments; those departments are Sciences and mathematics, Music and theater, Art and design, Languages, literature, and philosophy, Communication, and History, political science, geography, and paralegal.
Culinary Arts Institute
The MUW Culinary Arts Institute offers a Bachelor of Science in Culinary Arts and a minor in Culinary Arts.
Notable alumni
MUW alumni are known collectively as "The Long Blue Line."
Notable MUW alumni include:
- Tina Renee Johns Benkiser, chairman of the Republican Party of Texas from 2003 to 2009
- Dorothy Vredenburgh Bush, secretary of the Democratic National Committee (1944-1989) and the youngest person and first woman to be elected as an officer of either the Democratic or Republican party
- Helen Carloss, first woman to argue a case before all of the United States courts of appeals
- Kay Beevers Cobb Justice, Mississippi Supreme Court, retired
- Kathy Coole Miss Mississippi, 1973
- Cheryl Cooper, prize winning marketer
- Dr. Bettye Rogers Coward, President of Blue Mountain College, Blue Mountain, Mississippi
- Denise Dillard, award-winning playwright
- Chris Fryar, musician, drummer of Zac Brown Band
- Susan Golden, National Academy of Sciences member and Professor of Molecular Biology at University of California, San Diego
- Elizabeth Lee Hazen, co-discoverer of nystatin
- Glynda Hull, Professor of Education at the University of California, Berkeley
- David A. Ivey, elected first male student body president of MUW, 1991-1992
- Valerie Jaudon, award-winning artist
- L. Kim Kimbrough, award-winning New York Times Syndicate journalist and first female auto racing manager for Fortune 500 company Allied-Signal (now Honeywell)
- Evelyn McPhail, co-chair of Republican National Committee (1994-1997)
- Mary Libby Bickerstaff Payne, Mississippi Appeals Court Judge, retired
- Dr. Bridget Smith Pieschel, Director of MUW's Center for Women's Research and Public Policy, and author of Golden Days: Reminiscences of Alumnae, Mississippi State College for Women and Loyal Daughters: One Hundred Years at Mississippi University for Women, 1884-1984.
- Lenore Prather, first female Mississippi Supreme Court Justice
- Penelope J. Stokes, author
- Doris Taylor, scientist known for achievements in stem cell research
- Shannon A. Truesdell-Rader (nee Rickey), first female Navy ABH3 Aircraft Crash and Salvage Firefighting Crew Member (Crash and Smash) on board the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, CVN 69
- Eudora Welty, Pulitzer Prize-winning author
- Elizabeth H. West, notable librarian, first woman to head the Texas State Library, first librarian of Texas Tech University, co-founder and first President of the Southwestern Library Association
- Blanche Colton Williams, author and first editor of the O. Henry Prize Stories
- Toni Seawright, the first African-American Miss Mississippi (1987) and 4th runner-up to Miss America that same year
- Laverne Greene-Leech, one of three African-American students to desegregate Mississippi State College for Women (now MUW) in 1966
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