Marymount Manhattan College

Marymount Manhattan College
Motto	Omne Ignotum Pro Magnifico Est
Motto in English	We Have Great Notions of Things Unknown
Established	1936
Type	Private
President	Judson R. Shaver, PhD
Academic staff	101 Full-Time Faculty
Undergraduates	2,040[1]
Location	Upper East Side Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA
Campus	Main Building, Nugent Building
Colors	Blue & White
Mascot	The Griffin
Website	www.mmm.edu

Marymount Manhattan College is an urban, coeducational, independent, private, liberal arts college located in Manhattan, New York City, New York with a focus in performing arts. The mission of the College is to educate a socially and economically diverse student body by fostering intellectual achievement and personal growth and by providing opportunities for career development. Enrollment consists of 2040 undergraduates, with females making up 76.1% and males 23.9%.^[1]

History

Marymount Manhattan College

Directly from the college's website:

In 1976, Finch College, a women's college best known as a "finishing school" for affluent young women, closed and passed its records over to the school. The school was most famous for educating Tricia Nixon Cox, daughter of former US President Richard Nixon.

Since 1961, Marymount Manhattan has been an independent, private college open to all creeds, while noting its foundation by the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary. While the college no longer described itself as Catholic, the Catholic Church continued to list it in the Catholic Directory until 2005. Unaware that the college did not claim to be a Catholic school, the Cardinal Newman Society protested the college's announcement of its decision to invite then-Senator Hillary Clinton to deliver a commencement address and to confer an honorary doctoral degree upon her,^[3]due to Senator Clinton's longtime public support for abortion rights.^[3] In response to the protests and without objection by the college, it was de-listed from "The Official Catholic Directory," which identifies Catholic institutions.

In 2005 more than 2,000 students were enrolled representing 48 U.S. states and 36 countries. In conjunction with its core liberal arts curriculum, Marymount Manhattan offers 19 major programs of study and 38 minors along with certificates and preprofessional programs. It is accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. The school was recently featured in the noted industry publication Back Stage as one of the top colleges in which Broadway and Tony Award-nominated actors have trained, alongside Carnegie Mellon University, Oberlin Conservatory, University of Michigan, Ithaca College, NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, and the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.^[4]

In 2001, the College opened the 55th Street Residence Hall, which is one of the tallest dorms in the world^[5], with 32 floors of student housing in a 46 story building.

Distinguished Chairs

Five faculty members have been recognized by the College with its highest honor, Distinguished Chair.

• Susan Behrens (Ph.D., Brown University), co-editor of "Language in the Real World: An Introduction to Linguistics" (Routledge) and author of "Grammar: A Pocket Guide" (Routledge).
• Kathleen LeBesco (Ph.D., University of Massachusetts, Amherst), author of "Revolting Bodies? The Struggle to Redefine Fat Identity" (University of Massachusetts) and co-author of "Culinary Capital" (Berg Press) and "Bodies Out of Bounds: Fatness and Transgression" (University of California).
• Mark Ringer (Ph.D., University of California, Santa Barbara), author of "Electra and the Empty Urn: Metatheater and role playing in Sophocles" (University of North Carolina) and co-author of "Opera's First Master: The Musical Dramas of Claudio Monteverdi" (Amadeus Press).
• Jason Rosenfeld (Ph.D., New York University), author of "Pre-Raphaelites" (Tate) and "John Everett Millais" (Phaidson), and co-author of "Stephen Hannock" (Hudson Hills Press).
• Jill Stevenson (Ph.D., City University of New York), author of "Performance, Cognitive Theory, and Devotional Culture: Sensual Piety in Late Medieval York" (Palgrave, 2010).

Notable alumni

55th Street