Siena College was a private,
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
college located in
Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis is a city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the seat of Shelby County in the southwest part of the state; it is situated along the Mississippi River. With a population of 633,104 at the 2020 U.S. census, Memphis is the second-mos ...
. It was established by
Dominican nun
A nun is a woman who vows to dedicate her life to religious service, typically living under vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience in the enclosure of a monastery or convent.''The Oxford English Dictionary'', vol. X, page 599. The term is o ...
s in 1922 as St. Agnes College, the first Catholic women's college in the
Diocese of Nashville and in the Memphis metro area. Initially, the campus housed a Kindergarten through twelfth grade girls school and the college. It was the first college in Memphis to offer adult evening courses. In 1939, the
Saint Agnes Academy moved to a new campus (where it remains), and the name of St. Agnes College was changed to Siena College. The college eventually was moved to its own new campus on Poplar Avenue in 1953 where it was known for excellence in education until it closed in 1972.
Despite not officially merging with another Catholic college in Memphis,
Christian Brothers University
Christian Brothers University is a private Roman Catholic higher education institution in Memphis, Tennessee. It was founded in 1871 by the De La Salle Christian Brothers, a Catholic teaching order.
History
Christian Brothers University w ...
, CBU did change from being an all-male college to a
coeducational
Mixed-sex education, also known as mixed-gender education, co-education, or coeducation (abbreviated to co-ed or coed), is a system of education where males and females are educated together. Whereas single-sex education was more common up to ...
institution in 1972. Many Siena students became the first female students at CBU.
Defunct private universities and colleges in Tennessee
Christian Brothers University
Defunct Catholic universities and colleges in the United States
Universities and colleges established in 1922
Educational institutions disestablished in 1972
Universities and colleges in Memphis, Tennessee
Catholic universities and colleges in Tennessee
1922 establishments in Tennessee
{{Tennessee-university-stub