Vassar College
collegePrivate liberal arts college
| Vassar College link () Website | |
|---|---|
| File:Vassar College Seal.svg | |
| Formation | 1861 |
| Headquarters | Poughkeepsie, New York |
| Type | Private liberal arts college |
| Other name | Brewers |
| Exclusive and rich New York college, traditionally for women, now co-educational. | |
Vassar College is a highly selective private liberal arts college in Poughkeepsie, New York. Founded in 1861 by Matthew Vassar, it was the second degree-granting institution of higher education for women in the United States, closely following Elmira College. It became coeducational in 1969 and now has a gender ratio at the national average. The college is one of the historic Seven Sisters, the first elite women's colleges in the U.S., and has a historic relationship with Yale University, which suggested a merger before they both became coeducational institutions. About 2,450 students attend the college.
The college offers B.A. degrees in more than 50 majors and features a flexible curriculum designed to promote a breadth of studies. Student groups at the college include theater and comedy organizations, acappella groups, club sports teams, volunteer and service groups, and a circus troupe. Vassar College's varsity sports teams, known as the Brewers, play in the NCAA's Division III as members of the Liberty League.
The Vassar campus comprises over 1,000 acres (400 ha) and more than 100 buildings, including two National Historic Landmarks and an additional National Historic Place. A designated arboretum, the campus features more than 200 species of trees, a native plant preserve, and a 530-acre (210 ha) ecological preserve.
Academics

Vassar confers a Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree in more than 50 majors, including the Independent Major, in which a student may design a major, as well as various interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary fields of study. Students also participate in such programs as the Self-Instructional Language Program (SILP) which offers courses in Hindi, Irish/Gaelic, Korean, Portuguese, Swahili, Swedish, Turkish, and Yiddish. Vassar has a flexible curriculum intended to promote breadth in studies. While each field of study has specific requirements for majors, the only universal requirements for graduation are proficiency in a foreign language, a quantitative course, and a freshman writing course. Students are also encouraged to study abroad, which they typically do during one or two semesters of their junior year. Students (usually juniors) may apply for a year or a semester away either in the U.S. or abroad. Vassar sponsors programs in China, England, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, [[Italy, Turkey, Mexico, Morocco, Spain, and Russia; students may also join pre-approved programs offered by other colleges. Students may also apply for approved programs at various U.S. institutions, including the historically Black colleges and members of the Twelve College Exchange.
All classes are taught by members of the faculty, and there are no graduate students or teachers' assistants. The most popular majors, in terms of sheer numbers, are English, political science, psychology, economics and biology. Vassar also offers a variety of correlate sequences, or minors, for intensive study in many disciplines.
Notable people
Notable Vassar alumni include: Template:Colbegin
- Elizabeth Hazleton Haight (1894), notable feminist and Classics scholar
- Anita Florence Hemmings (1897), their first graduate of African ancestry
- Edith Clarke (1908), the first female Electrical Engineer
- Mary Ingraham (1908), founder of the United Service Organizations (USO)
- Ruth Starr Rose (1910), artist
- Edna St. Vincent Millay (1917), poet
- Grace Hopper (1928), computer pioneer
- Mary McCarthy (1933), critic and novelist
- Elizabeth Bishop (1934), poet
- Frances Scott Fitzgerald (1942), writer and journalist
- Beatrix Hamburg (1944), physician
- Frances Farenthold (1946), politician and activist
- Vera Rubin (1948), astrophysicist
- Linda Nochlin (1951), Art Historian
- Lois Haibt (1955), member of FORTRAN development team
- Nina Zagat (1963), Zagat Survey co-founder
- Bernadine P. Healy (1965), physician and National Institutes of Health director
- Lucinda Cisler (1965), feminist and abortion rights activist
- Geraldine Laybourne (1969), Nickelodeon President and Oxygen Media founder and CEO
- Linda Fairstein (1969), author and prosecutor
- Rebecca Eaton (1969), Emmy award-winning executive producer of Masterpiece on PBS
- Meryl Streep (1971), three-time Academy Award winner actress
- Jane Smiley (1971), Pulitzer Prize-winning fiction writer
- Michael Wolff (1975), author and journalist
- Richard L. Huganir (1975), Neuroscientist and Director of Johns Hopkins Medicine Brain Science Institute
- Chip Reid (1977), CBS News Chief White House Correspondent
- Jeffrey Goldstein (1977), former World Bank CFO and Undersecretary of the Treasury for Domestic Finance
- Michael Specter (1977), The New Yorker magazine science writer
- Jamshed Bharucha (1978), Cooper Union President
- Phil Griffin (1979), MSNBC President
- John Carlstrom (1981), astrophysicist and MacArthur Award Fellow
- Mark Burstein (1984), President of Lawrence University of Wisconsin
- Lisa Kudrow (1985), actress
- Hope Davis (1986), actress
- Evan Wright (1988), journalist
- Jonathan Karl (1990), ABC News Chief White House Correspondent
- Jeffrey Brenner (1990), physician and MacArthur Award Fellow
- Noah Baumbach (1991), writer-director
- Jason Blum (1991), film and television producer
- Caterina Fake (1991), Flickr founder
- Elisabeth Murdoch (1992), Shine Limited CEO and Chairman
- Jon Fisher (1994), author
- Katherine Center (1994), novelist
- Joe Hill (1995), novelist
- Jessi Klein (1997), Emmy Award-winning comedy writer-producer
- Jesse Ball (2000), writer
- Alexandra Berzon (2001), Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and Wall Street Journal reporter
- Victoria Legrand (2003), musician and songwriter
- Jonás Cuarón (2005), screenwriter and director
- Sasha Velour (2009), winner of RuPaul's Drag Race Season 9
- Lilli Cooper (2012), Tony Award-nominated actress
- Ethan Slater (2014), Tony Award-nominated actor
- Raph Korine (2017), and runner-up of Big Brother 18 (UK)
Notable attendees who did not graduate from Vassar include:
- Julia Tutwiler, notable education and prison reform advocate
- Anthony Bourdain, professional chef and television personality
- Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, First Lady
- Katharine Graham, Washington Post publisher
- Susan Berresford, president of the Ford Foundation
- Anne Hathaway, actresses Jane Fonda and
- Justin Long, actor
- Mike D, member of the Beastie Boys
- Mark Ronson, Oscar-winning musician
- Rachael Yamagata, musician
- Curtis Sittenfeld, and writer
Notable Vassar faculty include:
- Maria Mitchell, pioneering female astronomer
- Grace Hopper, computer scientist
- Monique Wittig, philosopher
- Grace Macurdy, classicist
- Richard Edward Wilson, composer
- Uma Narayan, philosopher
- Mitchell Miller, philosopher
- Bryan W. Van Norden, philosopher
- James Merrell, historian
- Peter Stillman, political scientist
- Paul Russell, writer
- Hua Hsu, writer
- Nancy Willard, writer
- Frank Bergon, writer
- Michael Joyce, writer and pioneer of hypertext fiction