Colleges

The University of West Alabama was chartered in 1835 as a church-related female academy and admitted its first students in 1839. After difficult times during the Civil War and Reconstruction periods, the school reopened in the late 1860s or early 1870s. Although it appears that a few male students were admitted following the reopening, a resolution by the Board of Trustees in 1876 excluded boys, and this policy was followed until the beginning of the 20th century.

From 1881 to 1910 the school at Livingston was under the direction of the noted educator and reformer Julia Tutwiler, who succeeded in getting a small appropriation from the State Legislature in 1883 to establish normal school training for girls at Livingston Female Academy. According to statements in the University archives, this is believed to be the first State appropriation in Alabama made exclusively for the education of women. The first normal school diplomas were granted in 1886.

Livingston Female Academy and State Normal College continued as a private institution with some State support until 1907, when the State assumed full control. It remained under its own board of trustees, however, until the Legislature created a State Board of Trustees for all the normal schools in 1911. In 1919 this board was abolished and all state normal schools were placed under the supervision of the State Board of Education. During these early years the school offered both secondary education and normal school programs for the training of teachers.

In 1929 the school at Livingston became State Teachers College, Livingston, Alabama, with authority to confer the degree of Bachelor of Science. The Bachelor of Arts degree was authorized in 1947. Although the institution had begun accepting male students soon after 1900, the student body remained predominantly female through the 1950s.

In 1957 the name was again changed by an act of Legislature — this time to Livingston State College — and the following year the mission of the institution was broadened when the Graduate Division was established and the College was authorized to confer master’s degrees in the field of professional education. In 1967 an act of the Legislature created Livingston University, with its own Board of Trustees.

In 1995 the institution recognized its broader mission as a regional university serving the educational needs of all the citizens of the area by changing its name to The University of West Alabama.

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As a regional, state-assisted institution of higher education, the University of North Alabama pursues its mission of engaging in teaching, research, and service in order to provide educational opportunities for students, and environment for discovery and creative accomplishment, and a variety of outreach activities meeting the professional, civic, social, cultural, and economic development needs of our region in the context of a global community.

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The University of South Alabama, the only major public institution of higher learning on the upper Gulf Coast, was created by act of the Alabama State Legislature in May, 1963. With Alabama’s two older universities more than 200 miles distant, the University is strategically located in the greater Mobile area, which has a population of more than a million within a 100-mile radius.

Mailing Address:
University of South Alabama
307 University Boulevard
Mobile, Alabama 36688-0002
(251) 460-6101

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The University of Montevallo, founded in 1896, offers students from throughout the state and region an educational experience of high quality, with a strong emphasis on undergraduate liberal studies. Located in the town of Montevallo, 35 miles south of Birmingham, the University is spread out across a 160-acre main campus, surrounded by lawns, groves, and flower beds.

In 1995, Montevallo was invited to join the prestigious Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges, a consortium of 25 institutions that share a commitment to undergraduate liberal arts education, high achievement by students, high retention and graduation rates and high levels of placement in graduate and professional schools.

Today, undergraduate programs are offered in more than 70 academic areas, but the full-time student-to-faculty ratio is only about 16-to-1. Members of the faculty come from prestigious institutions from across the United States, with a large percentage holding terminal degrees in their respective academic disciplines.

U.S. News & World Report has ranked the University as a Tier One master’s-level institution, giving UM the distinction of being the highest ranked public master’s-level university in Alabama. UM, in its division, posted a No. 2 ranking in the South in a category called “Great Schools-Great Prices,” (called “Best Colleges: Best Values” online) noting schools that are the best values, in the 2009 edition. Among public master’s-level schools in the South, Montevallo moved up one place, from 20th in 2008 to 19th in 2009.

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Founded in 1961 and affiliated with the Alabama Baptist State
Convention, the University of Mobile provides a unique combination of academic excellence and personal attention in a distinctively Christian environment.

Serving more than 1,600 students from over 30 states and 24 nations, the University of Mobile offers more than 40 areas of study in the College of Arts & Sciences; the schools of Business, Christian Studies, Education and Nursing; the Center for Performing Arts and the Center for Adult Programs. The University of Mobile’s commitment to integrating Christian faith and learning, personalized attention, and academic excellence are the cornerstones that provide our students with a solid foundation for success throughout their lives.

UM’s beautiful 880-acre campus is located 10 minutes north of historic downtown Mobile, Alabama and about an hour from sunny Gulf Coast beaches.

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