Concordia College Alabama
Historically black, Lutheran college in Alabama. Closed in 2018.
Concordia College Alabama was a private, historically black college associated with the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod and located in Selma, Alabama. It was the only historically black college among the 10 colleges and universities in the Concordia University System. The college ceased operations at the end of the spring 2018 semester, citing years of financial distress and declining enrollment.
History
In 1919, African-American Lutheran congregations in Alabama petitioned the Evangelical Lutheran Synodical Conference of North America for funds to open a high school and college to train church workers. The school opened in 1922 in a rented cottage, and the Synodical Conference soon purchased 13 acres (5.3 ha) in northeast Selma, Alabama, as the site of the Alabama Luther College. A recitation hall (now named Bakke Hall) and a dormitory were erected at a cost of $36,000 and opened in 1925.
The college was forced to close during the Great Depression and the remaining high school was renamed the Alabama Lutheran Academy. Eventually the college was reopened, resulting in the name Alabama Lutheran Academy and College. In 1981, the name was changed to Concordia College Alabama, and in 1994, it gained accreditation from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools as a bachelor's degree-granting institution.
In February 2018, the college announced that it would close at the conclusion of its academic year due to enduring financial problems.
“Concordia College Alabama” enters the record as historically black, Lutheran college in Alabama. Closed in 2018. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Concordia, College and Alabama can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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This entry incorporates text from “Concordia College Alabama” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.