Drew University - History

History

In 1867, Daniel Drew (1797–1879), a financier and railroad tycoon, endowed his antebellum estate in Madison for the purpose of establishing the Drew Theological Seminary. John McClintock was the first president of the Seminary. To this day, the Theological Seminary continues to graduate candidates for service in the ministry; however, the institution grew to include a liberal arts curriculum.

Dr. James Strong first published his seminal work, Strong's Concordance, in 1890, during his tenure as Professor of exegetical theology at Drew Theological Seminary.

The College of Liberal Arts admitted its first class of 12 students in 1928, after the trustees of the Drew Theological Seminary voted to accept a gift of $1.5 million from brothers Arthur and Leonard Baldwin to build and endow such an institution, and to change the name of the institution to Drew University. In 1955, a Graduate School became the third of the university's degree-granting entities.

From its beginnings, the College of Liberal Arts has honored its founders' wish that it be ecumenical in its choice of faculty and students. The Baldwins also asked that the new institution be named Brothers College in recognition of their extraordinary relationship. The name was later changed to the College of Liberal Arts, but its major academic building still bears its original name.

In its early years, Drew provided educational opportunities for women, through enrollment in religious classes. However, for a brief time, Drew became an all-male institution, during the 1930s until 1942.

During the Second World War, the draft threatened to take too many of Drew's students and the college of liberal arts responded by enrolling both women and US Navy recruits, through a V-12 Navy College Training Program. Drew was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the program which offered students a path to a Navy commission. At this time, Drew became coeducational.

During the 1970s, the College also established, with generous assistance from the Mellon Foundation, a now widely-imitated freshman seminar program. It allows first-year students to participate, with faculty who also serve as their academic advisers, in intensive study of a topic of hopefully mutual interest. Interdisciplinary study became a focus of the curriculum as well, with the creation of majors in behavioral studies, neuroscience and Russian Studies, and minors in such fields as American studies, arts administration and museology, business management, dance, public health and writing.

In 1984, psychology professors Philip Jensen and Richard Detweiler led an effort to provide a personal computer and application software to all incoming freshman, a program referred to as the "Computer Initiative". Drew was the first liberal arts college to have such a requirement. The Computer Initiative differentiates Drew from other liberal arts colleges, and continues to this day. As a result, Drew has considerably fewer public computing labs than comparable schools its size, utilizing the centrally-managed student laptops for instructional and general-purpose computing use.

Thomas Kean, former Governor of New Jersey (1982–1990) and Co-Chairman of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, was Drew's president for 15 years and stepped down in June, 2005. Robert Weisbuch, former President of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, was named Drew's eleventh president in July 2005 and formally inaugurated on April 28, 2006. He resigned in June of 2012, being replaced by Dr. Vivian Bull, a former economics professor at Drew, and the President of Linfield College for 13 years.

During his tenure as president, Kean succeeded in adding new faculty in African, Asian, Russian, and Middle Eastern Studies, significantly increased opportunities for students to study abroad, increased applications from prospective students, nearly tripled the school's endowment, and committed more than $60 million to construction of new buildings and renovation of older buildings—principally student residence halls.

For the 2012-2013 year, Drew University's undergraduate costs are $54,200 (excluding books, personal expenditures, and health insurance), making Drew the most expensive school in the state of New Jersey. Drew University offers both academic scholarships and need-based financial aid. Drew University is home to the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, and the archives of the United Methodist Church.

On May 2, 2012, Robert Weisbuch announced his retirement effective on June 30, 2012, and the board chairman announced that Vivian Bull, professor emerita of economics and former president of Linfield College, would serve as interim president until a permanent replacement is selected.