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Former names | Trenton Business College (1865–1896) Rider Business College (1896–1920) Rider College (1920–1994) |
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Motto | In Omnia Paratus (Latin) |
Motto in English | In all things prepared |
Type | Private university |
Established | 1865 |
Academic affiliations | |
Endowment | $44.4 million, Rider; $20 million Westminster Choir College (2020) [3] |
President | Gregory G. Dell'Omo |
Academic staff | >200 full time [4] |
Students | 3,693 |
Location | , , United States 40°16′48″N74°44′17″W / 40.280°N 74.738°W |
Campus | suburban, 303 acres (1.23 km2) [4] |
Colors | Cranberry and Grey [5] |
Nickname | Broncs |
Sporting affiliations | NCAA Division I |
Website | www |
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Rider University is a private university in Lawrence Township, New Jersey. It consists of three academic units: the Norm Brodsky College of Business, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the College of Education and Human Services. [6]
The school was founded as Trenton Business College on October 1, 1865, by Henry Beadman Bryant and Henry D. Stratton, operators of the Bryant and Stratton chain of private business schools. The school was located in Temperance Hall at the corner of South Broad and Front Streets in Trenton, New Jersey. Andrew J Rider was appointed as its first president. [7] President Rider owned 500 acres of cranberry bogs near Hammonton, New Jersey. According to tradition, this is why the school colors are cranberry and white.
The school grew and periodically moved to larger quarters. In 1896 women were admitted. In 1896 the school was renamed Rider Business College. President Rider stepped down the following year. [7]
In 1920 the institution moved to East State Street in Trenton and officially became known as Rider College. In 1922 the New Jersey Board of Education granted Rider College permission to confer the degrees of Bachelor of Accounts and Bachelor of Commercial Science. In 1957 Rider Business College introduced liberal studies leading to a Bachelor of Arts degree. [7]
In 1959 Rider College moved its campus to a 283-acre suburban tract on Route 206 in Lawrence Township, N.J. On November 15, 1961, President Franklin F. Moore (a 1927 alumnus of the college) announced the gradual reorganization of the college into five separate schools, each headed by a dean who would report to the provost. The changes took effect with the 1962–63 academic year. The five schools included a new School of Liberal Arts and Sciences. [8]
Rider College merged with nearby Westminster Choir College (WCC), located in Princeton, New Jersey, in 1991–92. On April 13, 1994, the college became Rider University. [9]
In 2005 Rider completed its 63,000-square-foot (5,900 m2) Student Recreation Center (SRC), a 186-bed residence hall, and three-story additions to Ziegler and Hill Residence Halls. The SRC contains locker rooms, a 3,600-square-foot (330 m2) fitness room and various athletic facilities. [10]
Rider University's bonds have been rated as junk since 2020. [11] As of 2023, the school has experienced financial difficulties and a loss of a fifth of its student body due to declining enrollment. [12]
Rider has had seven presidents:
The 280-acre (1.1 km2) Lawrenceville campus is in a suburban area three miles (5 km) north of Trenton and five miles (8 km) south of Princeton.
Classes are held in Birenbaum Fisher Hall, The Mike and Patti Hennessy Science and Technology Center, the Fine Arts Center, Anne Brossman Sweigart Hall and Lynch Adler Hall. Built in 2011, Lynch Adler Hall is a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design silver certified, 21,250-square-foot (1,974 m2) building. [13] [14]
The Franklin F. Moore Library supports the academic programs with a collection of more than 481,000 volumes, 2,000 periodical titles, 650,000 microforms, 134 online databases, electronic access to 42,000 journals, and an audiovisual collection. Westminster Choir College's Talbott Library has specialized music resources including 75,000 books, music scores and periodicals, a choral music reference collection of more than 80,000 titles and more than 31,000 sound and video recordings.
Rider Libraries are the official depository for records created by the New Jersey Business Teachers Association and the Eastern Business Teachers Association. In special collections, there is a microfilm collection of Civil War Era diplomatic correspondence between the United States, France and Great Britain. It also holds a major collection of Delaware Valley newspapers reaching back to the 18th century. [15]
Rider offers more than 150 student clubs and organizations [18] . There are also more than a dozen Greek organizations. In addition to social Greek organizations, there are professional and honorary fraternities. [19]
On March 30, 2007, 18-year-old student Gary DeVercelly died of alcohol poisoning after heavy drinking at a Phi Kappa Tau fraternity house. [20] The incident was tied to a longstanding hazing tradition involving dangerous quantities of alcohol. [21] Two Rider University officials, including the dean of students, and three students were indicted for aggravated hazing; [22] the charges were dismissed for lack of evidence. [23] Settlement of the civil lawsuit resulted in major policy concessions by the university.
Athletic teams are nicknamed the Broncs. The school competes in the NCAA Division I Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference. As the MAAC is a non-wrestling conference, Rider's wrestling team competes as a member of the Mid-American Conference.
The intercollegiate sports program at Rider was started by coach Clair Bee in the 1920s. Two of the school's most famous athletic alumni are former Notre Dame basketball coach and current ESPN sportscaster Digger Phelps, who played basketball at Rider from 1959 to 1963, and Jason Thompson, who played basketball at Rider from 2004 to 2008 and was drafted by the Sacramento Kings.
The university competed in football until 1951, when the football team was disbanded.
In 2007, the university redesigned its athletic logo. [24]
Lawrenceville is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) within Lawrence Township in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The community is situated roughly halfway between Princeton and Trenton. Lawrenceville is part of the Trenton–Princeton metropolitan area within the New York combined statistical area; however, the CDP actually is located approximately 15 miles closer to Philadelphia than to New York City, and as with the remainder of Mercer County, lies within the Federal Communications Commission's Philadelphia Designated Market Area. As of the 2020 census, the CDP's population was 3,751, a decrease of 136 (−3.5%) from the 3,887 recorded at the 2010 census, which in turn had reflected a decrease of 194 (−4.8%) from the 4,081 counted in the 2000 census.
Lawrence Township is a township in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Located at the cross-roads between the Delaware Valley region to the southwest and the Raritan Valley region to the northeast, the township is an outer-ring suburb of New York City in the New York Metropolitan area, as defined by the United States Census Bureau, while also directly bordering the Philadelphia metropolitan area and is part of the Federal Communications Commission's Philadelphia Designated Market Area.
The College of New Jersey (TCNJ) is a public university in Ewing Township, New Jersey. It is part of New Jersey's public system of higher education. Established in 1855 as the New Jersey State Normal School, TCNJ was the first normal school, or teaching college, in the state of New Jersey and the fifth in the United States. It was originally located in Trenton proper and moved to its present location in adjacent Ewing Township during the early to mid-1930s. Since its inception, TCNJ has undergone several name changes, the most recent being the 1996 change from Trenton State College to its current name.
Seton Hall University (SHU) is a private Roman Catholic research university in South Orange, New Jersey. Founded in 1856 by then-Bishop James Roosevelt Bayley and named after his aunt, Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, Seton Hall is the oldest diocesan university in the United States.
William Paterson University, known as WP, officially William Paterson University of New Jersey (WPUNJ), is a public university in Wayne, New Jersey. It is part of New Jersey's public system of higher education.
Saint Peter's University is a private Jesuit university in Jersey City, New Jersey. Founded as Saint Peter's College in 1872 by the Society of Jesus, the university offers over 60 undergraduate and graduate programs to more than 3,600 undergraduate and 2,000 graduate students. Its mascot is the peacock and its sports teams play in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference, of which it is a founding member.
New Jersey City University (NJCU) is a public university in Jersey City, New Jersey. Originally chartered in 1927, NJCU consists of the School of Business, College of Arts and Sciences, College of Education, and College of Professional Studies and is part of New Jersey's public system of higher education. In 2022, it announced that it was severely reducing its academic offerings due to a budgetary crisis. In 2024, the school considered financially stable though still underfunded.
Rowan University is a public research university in Glassboro, New Jersey, with a medical campus in Stratford and medical and academic campuses in Camden. Founded in 1923 as Glassboro Normal School on a 25-acre (10 ha) site donated by 107 residents, the school was formerly known as Glassboro State College from 1958 until 1992 and Rowan College of New Jersey from 1992 to 1997.
Westminster Choir College (WCC) is an historic conservatory of music, currently operating on the campus of Rider University, in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. Rider's College of Arts and Sciences consists of Westminster Choir College and an additional three schools.
Alumni Gymnasium is a 1,650-seat multi-purpose arena in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. It is home to the Rider University Broncs basketball, volleyball and wrestling teams. It was one of the first buildings built on the Lawrenceville campus upon moving from downtown Trenton. Its first event was the school's 1958 commencement; the first Broncs basketball game was the home opener against Seton Hall. The Northeast Conference men's basketball championship games were held there from 1993 to 1995.
Notre Dame High School is a coeducational, Roman Catholic, college preparatory school in the Lawrenceville section of Lawrence Township, in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The school operates under the supervision of the Catholic Diocese of Trenton. The school has been accredited by Cognia since 2013.
Hamilton High School West is a four-year comprehensive public high school serving students in ninth through twelfth grade located in Hamilton Township, in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, operating as one of the three secondary schools of the Hamilton Township School District; the other high schools in the district are Hamilton High School North-Nottingham High School and Hamilton High School East- Steinert High School.
Trenton Central High School is a three-year comprehensive public high school that serves students in tenth through twelfth grades from Trenton, in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, operating as part of the Trenton Public Schools.
Trenton Catholic Preparatory Academy is a Catholic school in Trenton, in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It serves students in pre-kindergarten through twelfth grades and formerly operated under the auspices of the Diocese of Trenton. Since the start of the 2021-22 school year, the school operates under an independent board of trustees.
The Rider Broncs are the athletic teams of Rider University, a private nonsectarian university in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, United States. The school is a Division I member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), and its athletes compete in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC). For wrestling only, Rider is an affiliate member of the Mid-American Conference (MAC).
Kevin Bannon is a former American men's college basketball head coach who most recently served as head coach at Rutgers University from 1997 through 2001. Prior to that he spent eight years as head coach of Rider University's team and seven more as the coach of Trenton State College.
The Lawrenceville School is a coeducational preparatory school for boarding and day students located in the Lawrenceville section of Lawrence Township, in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Lawrenceville is a member of the Eight Schools Association and the Ten Schools Admissions Organization.
As of 2023, New Jersey has five teams from major professional sports leagues playing in the state, with only one team identifying themselves as solely being from the state. The other remaining teams identify themselves as being from the New York metropolitan area with the National Women's Soccer League team having a team name that includes both New Jersey and New York. The National Hockey League and National Basketball Association teams representing Philadelphia have their training facilities in South Jersey.
The Burlington County Institute of Technology Medford Campus is a four-year countywide vocational-technical public high school serving students in ninth through twelfth grades from Burlington County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, as part of the Burlington County Institute of Technology. Located in Medford, the campus is one of two high schools in the district, along with the Westampton campus.
Darrick Suber is an American former basketball player. He had a standout college career at Rider University in which he was the 1993 Northeast Conference Player of the Year. He was the first 2,000-point scorer in Rider history, and his game-winning shot in the 1993 Northeast Conference men's basketball tournament championship propelled the Broncs to their second-ever NCAA Tournament.