Newbury College (United States)

Newbury College was a private college in Brookline, Massachusetts. Founded in 1962, Newbury College offered bachelor and associate degree programs in over 20 career-focused majors.

Although the college was accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges, it was placed on probation in mid-2018 because it was facing significant financial challenges. In December 2018, the college announced that it would close in the spring of 2019 at the end of the academic year.

Lasell University is now the Institution of Record for the college and all enrollment verifications and copies of transcripts for Newbury are provided by Lasell.

History

Newbury College was founded in 1962 on Newbury Street in Boston's Back Bay. It was founded as the Newbury School of Business by entrepreneur and educator Edward J. Tassinari. Tassinari's goal in establishing this institution was to help supply local Boston businesses with competent and educated employees.

In the 1960s as the college began to expand, it acquired dormitories on Commonwealth Avenue. In 1968, the Newbury School of Business relocated to Boylston Street, at the former location of Bentley College. Shortly thereafter, in 1971, the school changed its status from a school of business to a junior college. It then began granting associate degrees and officially changed its name to Newbury Junior College.

As the Junior College continued to grow, it began to acquire other schools throughout the Greater Boston area that were on the verge of collapse, including Holliston Junior College and Grahm Junior College. The most notable of these schools was the Boston branch of a 110-year-old business school, Bryant & Stratton College, which Newbury acquired in 1975.

In 1973, the school became one of the first colleges in the region to establish satellite campuses. At one point in the 1990s, the college had a total of 15 campus extension sites throughout Eastern Massachusetts. These were located in Arlington, Attleboro, Boston, Braintree/ Weymouth, Brookline, Dorchester, Framingham, Hopedale/ Milford, Lowell, Lynn, New Bedford, Norwood, Revere, Taunton, and Wakefield.

In 1982, the junior college acquired the former Cardinal Cushing College and began relocating the school to Brookline, Massachusetts. As the college began physically expanding and acquiring buildings in the surrounding area, the satellite campuses began to consolidate into one centralized college campus.

The school changed its name to Newbury College in 1985, and in 1994, it became a baccalaureate college. Newbury then offered both associate and bachelor degrees on its Brookline campus.

In the fall of 2015, Newbury transformed the college's library into a 16,000-square-foot "Student Success Center", the first major renovation project on campus in more than 20 years.

In December 2018, the college announced it would shut down following the completion of the spring 2019 semester after several years of declining enrollment.

Campus

Newbury was situated from downtown Boston in the Fisher Hill neighborhood of Brookline, Massachusetts. The campus consisted of eight buildings, many of which were formerly private residences.

Academics

Newbury College was accredited by the Commission on Institution of Higher Education (CIHE) of the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC) and offered associate's and bachelor's degrees in over 20 career-focused majors. It contained four schools: The School of Arts & Sciences; The Roger A. Saunders School of Business & Hospitality Management; The School of Applied Science & Human Services, and The School of Professional Studies. Newbury's general education was grounded in the liberal arts.

Enrollment and endowment

According to a March 31, 2018, report in ''The Boston Globe'', Newbury had 5,384 enrolled students in 1996 and that number fell to 751 in 2016. The college experienced a decrease in enrollment of over 86 percent in two decades based on data supplied by the United States Department of Education. This decline was due to the closing of the 15 extension sites, eliminating certificate programs, and concentrating on a baccalaureate degree program, with very few associate degree programs. Newbury focused on more in-demand majors, such as hospitality, criminal justice, and business. The college also entered into a partnership with Regis College, in nearby Weston, Massachusetts, which allows students to start a master's degree during their senior year at Newbury.

In 2018, tuition at Newbury was $33,000 per year, and room and board was approximately $15,000, but the college offered discounted tuition on a case-by-case basis. The average discount at the college was 52 percent.

Also in 2018, Newbury College had an endowment of $2 million.

During the summer of 2018, the college was placed on probation by the Commission on Institutions of Higher Education at the New England Association of Schools and Colleges over concerns about the school's finances.

Athletics

Newbury College was a member of Division III of the National Collegiate Athletic Association. The Newbury Nighthawks’ 16 athletic programs compete in nine NCAA-sponsored sports including baseball, basketball, cross country, soccer, track & field, softball, lacrosse, and volleyball.

The Newbury men's volleyball team won three Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Division III New England North titles and three national rankings in the 2000s. In 2008, the Nighthawks' men's volleyball program was ranked sixth in the nation with a 33–10 record and finished second in Northeast Collegiate Volleyball Association (NECVA) Championship Tournament.

The Nighthawk men's basketball team won an ECAC Division III New England title in 2007–2008 with a 21–9 record while the Newbury baseball team earned a trip to the ECAC tournament with 23–22 record in 2012.

The 2014-2015 Nighthawk Softball team ranked second in the nation for the National Fastpitch Coaches Association (NFCA) Top 10 All-Academic Team Award. The 2015-2016 team ranked first in the nation for this award, holding a higher GPA than all NCAA Division I, II, and III teams. The 2016-2017 team again ranked first for this award in Division III.

References

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Brookline, Massachusetts
Defunct private universities and colleges in Massachusetts
Educational institutions established in 1962
Educational institutions disestablished in 2019
Liberal arts colleges in Massachusetts
Universities and colleges in Norfolk County, Massachusetts
1962 establishments in Massachusetts
2019 disestablishments in Massachusetts