|
|
|
Historical OverviewAlfred W. Harris founded present-day Virginia State University in 1882. It was then known as Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute and represented the nation's first fully state-assisted college or university for Blacks. State funding now provides less than one-half of the resources needed to maintain the University. Led by its 12th president, Eddie N. Moore, Jr., former State Treasurer for the Commonwealth, the University continues a pattern of healthy fiscal management and growth, with a 2006-2007 operating budget of over $116 million.
One of two land-grant institutions in the Commonwealth of Virginia, VSU is a comprehensive, four-year university of over 5,000 students from 37 states, the District of Columbia, and 23 foreign countries. VSU students can earn degrees in 46 undergraduate and graduate programs among five academic schools. Students live and learn on a 236-acre main campus and a 416-acre agricultural research farm. The main campus includes more than 50 buildings, including 15 dormitories and 16 classroom buildings.
The campus sits atop a rolling landscape overlooking the Appomattox River in the southern Chesterfield County village of Ettrick. It is accessible by Interstates 95 and 85, which intersect in adjacent Petersburg, as well as U.S. Routes 1, 301 and 460. The University is centrally located about two hours away from Washington, DC to the north, the North Carolina Triangle area to the south, the Blue Ridge Mountains to the west and the Atlantic Ocean to the east.
The mission of Virginia State University is to promote and sustain academic programs that integrate instruction, research, and extension/public service in a design most responsive to the needs and endeavors of individuals and groups within our scope of influence. Students are provided a wide variety of cultural experiences designed to promote knowledge, self-awareness and commitment to assuming productive roles in society.
Virginia State University is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), the National Council of Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE), the Virginia State Board of Education, and has been recommended for accreditation by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB).
|
