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Former names | Mossy Creek Missionary Baptist Seminary (1851–1880) Carson College (1880–1889) Newman College (1880–1889) Carson and Newman College (1889–1941) Carson-Newman College (1941–2012) |
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Motto | Truth, Beauty, Goodness |
Type | Private university |
Established | 1851 |
Religious affiliation | Tennessee Baptist Mission Board |
Academic affiliations | CIC |
Endowment | $62.7 million (2023) |
President | Charles Fowler |
Academic staff | 122 (Full-Time) and 109 (Part-Time) [1] |
Administrative staff | 199 |
Students | 2,735 (Fall 2023) [1] |
Undergraduates | 1,669 (Fall 2023) [1] |
Postgraduates | 1,066 (Fall 2023) [1] |
Location | , Tennessee , United States |
Campus | Suburban, c. 200 – c. acre (roughly 1 mi wide by .4 mi deep) |
Colors | Orange & blue |
Nickname | Eagles |
Sporting affiliations | NCAA Division II – SAC |
Website | www |
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Carson-Newman University is a private university in Jefferson City, Tennessee, United States. Carson-Newman is affiliated with the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board. Founded in 1851, the university enrolls about 2,500 students. [2] Studies are offered in approximately 90 different academic programs.
Academic rankings | |
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National | |
U.S. News & World Report [3] | 361 (tie) of 394 |
Washington Monthly [4] | 198 of 438 |
Following a ten-year effort of five early East Tennessee Baptists, the school was established and chartered with the state of Tennessee as Mossy Creek Missionary Baptist Seminary in 1851, and construction began that summer on the first building on the west bank of the creek. While this was ongoing, the school held classes in a local Baptist church located near the old zinc mine on the current Allen and Phyllis Morgan East Campus. Within a year the school occupied its own building between the current Silver Diamond Baseball Complex and the East Campus. The campus gradually grew to the west, and is now a mile wide stretching across the northern end of Jefferson City.
In 1880, the institution was named Carson College for James Harvey Carson, who left $15,000 of his estate to the school. [5] [6] For several years it existed alongside Newman College, a separate facility for the education of women named for William Cate Newman, who had donated money to the women's college. In 1889, the two colleges united as one of the first coeducational institutions in the South. The institution operated as Carson-Newman College until 2012 when the board of trustees voted to acknowledge recent organizational changes by changing the name to Carson-Newman University. [7]
In 1919, Carson-Newman became officially affiliated with the Tennessee Baptist Convention. The college was admitted to membership in the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools in 1927 and the Association of American Colleges in 1928.
During World War II, Carson-Newman was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the V-12 Navy College Training Program which offered students a path to a Navy commission. [8]
In 2015 the school applied for and received a Title IX exemption so that it could maintain its status as a private Christian institution and also granting it the right to turn away "gay students, unwed mothers, women who've had an abortion and even students who may be pregnant" should it so choose to do so. [9] Then-President Randall O'Brien stated that the decision was made based on the advice of legal counsel and that the school does not discriminate and does not plan to. [10]
Through an alumni donation in 2007, the university acquired an overgrown wooded area of land along Mossy Creek, known as a dead creek. The property was turned into a park called Allen and Phyllis Morgan East Campus. In Fall 2017, the creek started showing fresh signs of life once again. [11] In 2019, the university completed construction on a 250-seat open air amphitheater on the East Campus.
On June 7, 2019, the trustees appointed Charles A. Fowler as the 23rd president of the university. Fowler began his tenure July 1, 2019.[ citation needed ]
Carson-Newman is a member of the South Atlantic Conference (SAC) and fields 21 varsity teams in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division II competition. Men's varsity sports at Carson-Newman are: baseball, basketball, cross country, football, golf, soccer, swimming, tennis, and track & field (indoor and outdoor). Women's sports are: basketball, beach volleyball, cross country, golf, soccer, softball, swimming, tennis, track & tield (indoor and outdoor), and volleyball.
Jefferson City is a city in Jefferson County, Tennessee, United States. It is part of the Morristown Metropolitan Statistical Area. As of the 2020 census the population was 8,419.
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Bernie Hawthorne Moore was an American college football, basketball, track and field coach and college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at Mercer University (1926–1928) and Louisiana State University (LSU) (1935–1947). Moore was also the head basketball coach at Mercer (1926–1928) and the head track and field coach at LSU (1930–1947). He was then SEC commissioner from 1948 to 1966. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1952.
Ken Sparks was an American football coach and player. He served as the head football coach at Carson–Newman University in Jefferson City, Tennessee from 1980 until his retirement at the end of the 2016 season. He is currently the record-holder for the most wins as a coach in NCAA Division II history. His Carson–Newman Eagles won five NAIA Championships, and were three times runners-up in the NCAA Division II playoffs.
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J. Randall O'Brien is the twenty-second president of Carson-Newman College in Jefferson City, Tennessee. The board of trustees unanimously elected him in July 2008. O'Brien succeeded Dr. James Netherton, who resigned in May 2007. He was inaugurated on October 30, 2009, after assuming administrative duties on January 1, 2009. O'Brien came to Carson-Newman from Baylor University where he was executive vice-president and provost. He was a popular theology professor, and received many teaching awards during his tenure at Baylor.
The Fain House is an historic mansion in Jefferson City, Tennessee in Jefferson County, Tennessee, United States. Originally the property of the Fain family, founding members of Mossy Creek, the mansion is now owned by Carson–Newman University and is known as the Honors Campus House.
William Allen Montgomery was an American lawyer, planter and Baptist minister. Trained as a lawyer in Tennessee, he was a cotton planter in Texas in the 1850s and served as a Confederate chaplain in the American Civil War. He served as the President of Carson–Newman University from 1888 to 1892.