What’s in a Name? An Enrollment Increase, When a College Becomes a University

[smartdegree]

I remember a post in another board where a Canadian complained that his William and Mary "College" degree is taken less seriously in the job market than the local community colleges like Seneca.  It sounded very accurate to me.  LOL

Canadian community colleges have also been moving away from "College!" Some in Ontario got their legal names changed from "College" to "Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning." Many now do a lot of branding under their unmodified name. Canadians will see a billboard or TV ad for "Seneca," "Humber," etc., and be assumed to know it's a college, or at least figure out it's a higher education institution. You know their administrators are dreaming of University status.

I wonder how many institutions have ever gone from University to College. Ashworth College est. 2000 becames Ashworth University sometime later in the 2000s or 10s but then became Ashworth College again (DEAC, same owners as Penn Foster, and later they retired their master's degrees).

Lind University in Illinois est. 1857 became Lake Forest University, then evolved to focus on undergraduate liberal arts and became Lake Forest College in 1965.

Good point on the "Institute of Technology" naming.  I see that a lot now.  Even private career colleges (a whole different category of higher education in Canada) use that term nowadays.  I have to guess it has something to do with branding and trying to woo international students, specifically from India and China.  India has its "Indian Institutes of Technology" that are widely considered as the most prestigious higher education institutions.  Also, MIT (which the average Indian engineer sees as >>>> Harvard).   China also uses the term Institute of Technology for some of its top universities.  Whereas there are no top Chinese universities named "College".

[dewisant]

I started with Excelsior when they were Regents College, which I prefer. When it was changed to Excelsior College, I made a smart remark about the new name and was told I would be suspended unless I retracted my remark. Now that they are becoming Excelsior University, I will only get a Masters from another school. I do not recommend Excelsior to anyone.

[Alpha]

Iona College becomes Iona University
Iona College becomes Iona University - CBS New York (cbsnews.com)

[ss20ts]

I started with Excelsior when they were Regents College, which I prefer. When it was changed to Excelsior College, I made a smart remark about the new name and was told I would be suspended unless I retracted my remark. Now that they are becoming Excelsior University, I will only get a Masters from another school. I do not recommend Excelsior to anyone.

Excelsior is the motto of New York State thus the college name. Excelsior is on the state seal and used to name numerous state programs. Many colleges would tell you to remove a smart remark towards their name. What's wrong with them renaming to a university? Being called a university is quite common when the school offers graduate programs.

https://www.nycourts.gov/home/stateseal/...20York.htm

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Iona College becomes Iona University
Iona College becomes Iona University - CBS New York (cbsnews.com)

I think with the recent change in NYS law we'll see more colleges in NY become universities.