Passion, Purpose & Personal Attention
Newberry College has a rich tradition of providing personal attention, challenging academic programs, and a close-knit community that welcomes everyone. We combine our strong liberal arts foundation with specialized professional degree programs to prepare students such as you for successful futures.
Our Advantage
We've Done It Again!
Newberry College made a strong showing on the 2018 U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges rankings, earning high marks for value and affordability.
Transforming Lives: Transforming Education
What Newberry awakens in you academically, socially, civically, and spiritually is more than the time spent pursuing a degree: it's a way of life.
A Newberry College education reaches beyond classroom walls, city limits, pre-conceived notions of higher learning, and definitions of success. A Newberry education is a personal challenge to every student in pursuit of knowledge who possesses the drive to live and learn with purpose. It is a new model for education - a living and learning community that transforms study into action through personal and professional interaction.
A thriving community of students, professors, staff, coaches, administrators, professionals, and neighbors, Newberry College takes an innovative approach to the traditional liberal arts education. Through hands-on, real-world experiential learning, students connect what they learn in the classroom and laboratory with what they learn in town, in the field, and on the job.
We empower students to embrace an evolution of thought and a new way to see by challenging their minds as well as their imaginations. We stand with purpose, tools, understanding, and experiences designed to prepare a new generation of citizen leaders to transform our world through knowledge, faith, and service.
A Community Within A Community
The Newberry College 90-acre, wooded campus is located less than a mile from local shopping areas in the small town of Newberry, South Carolina. Our 32 buildings and athletic facilities are well-equipped to serve student needs.
Visit Campus
The College centers on a quadrangle heavily planted with azaleas, trees and shrubs. On three sides of the quadrangle are the four campus buildings listed in the National Register of Historic Places: Smeltzer Hall, Keller Hall, Holland Hall, and Derrick Hall. On the fourth side are the McClurg Center for Teaching and Learning, Langford Communications Center, and Wessels Library.
The Herman Langford Communications Center, completed in 1990, has state-of-the-art communications facilities including a TV studio, radio station, and suites for audio and video production.The McClurg Center, along with the nearby Science and Mathematics Building, houses classrooms, seminar rooms, science and computer laboratories, art studios, and offices.
Wessels Library houses a comprehensive collection of books, periodicals, and non-print materials. Through its Inter-Library arrangements, students have access to research materials throughout the nation. In the Special Collections room are many historical documents relating to Lutheranism and to the local area as well as a special facsimile of the Book of Kells.
One of the most easily visible buildings on campus is Wiles Chapel with its soaring steeple, neo-gothic design, and neo-impressionistic stained glass windows. It houses a 1,000-seat chapel where convocations and interfaith services are held.
The Alumni Music Center houses a 150-seat recital hall, practice rooms, a band room, offices, and classrooms. The Physical Education Complex houses the 1,600-seat Eleazer basketball arena, the Yarborough Strength and Conditioning Facility, offices, and classrooms. Other athletic facilities include the lighted tennis courts, Setzler Field, a 4,000-seat football stadium, the John F. Clarkson outdoor swimming pool, the H. Lee Atwater Field, a combination soccer/softball field, as well as intramural and other playing fields.
The O. L. Casey Center adjoins the swimming pool and the Physical Education Complex. It houses the Athletic Department.
Preparing Students for a Lifetime of Success
Newberry College prepares students in the Lutheran liberal arts tradition through our supportive academic community for lifelong intellectual and personal development, meaningful vocation, and engaged citizenship in the global society.
Intellectual Development
Students will acquire, develop, and demonstrate:
- knowledge of the arts, sciences, and humanities as ways of understanding the world and our place in it.
- effective oral and written communication skills.
- critical thinking and quantitative analytical skills necessary for interpreting information and solving problems in a 21st-century global society.
- proficiency in information literacy.
Personal Development
Students will acquire, develop, and demonstrate:
- the ability to work with others as leaders or as members of a team to accomplish common goals in a diverse society.
- an understanding of the heritage of the Christian faith and its contribution to humane problem solving in the evolving global community.
- moral reasoning skills essential for making life choices that balance personal freedoms and societal responsibilities.
- the knowledge, attitudes, and habits that contribute to a healthy lifestyle.
Meaningful Vocation
Students will acquire, develop, and demonstrate:
- knowledge of the history, methods of inquiry, and current intellectual claims of a chosen specific discipline or interdisciplinary area of study.
- knowledge and skills that foster life-long personal growth and professional development in their vocational pursuits.
Engaged Citizenship in a Global Society
Students will acquire, develop, and demonstrate:
- the values necessary for effective citizenship.
- the skills and historical knowledge to think critically about complex national and global issues.
- the qualities of personal and social responsibility necessary to sustain and deepen democracy.
The Lutheran intellectual tradition creatively engages the dialectic tensions inherent in the dynamic nature of human life. Newberry College will re-affirm itself publicly as aligned with the Lutheran church, and be guided by a set of educational principles that emanates from the Lutheran intellectual traditions. These Lutheran core values include:
Faith and Reason
Truth is the ultimate objective of both Faith and Reason which is best obtained through the integrated pursuit of free inquiry, hypothesis and rigorous scholarship. In keeping with the school’s historic faith, motto and mission, Newberry College leads students to learn and respect the Christian faith, history, traditions and supporting documents in the context of a pluralistic dialogue among the sciences, arts and global religions.
Freedom and Responsibility
Each person has individual rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as well as corporate responsibility for others in an environmental and civil context. Newberry College encourages all members of its community to use the unique freedoms and characteristics of individual personhood as his/her fundamental contribution to citizenship in both local and global community participation.
Diversity and Inclusivity
Community arises when people of widely diverse walks and degrees of faith, cultural backgrounds, genders, races and nations of origin recognize their shared humanity. At Newberry, empathetic knowledge of one-another-modeling civil discourse is fostered as well as respecting each person’s dignity and individuality, and seeking to understand fully self and others as equally valued global citizens.
Personal and Public Vocation
Vocation affirms the sacred nature of the whole person: his or her personal and public relationships, divinely revealed gifts, and contributions to church and society. Newberry College encourages each individual to discover and pursue his or her calling and to exhibit faithful service to God and community in every facet of life.
Newberry College celebrated its 150th anniversary of service and educational leadership to the Newberry community, state of South Carolina, and the Lutheran Church in 2006.
Newberry's heritage began in 1828 at the annual meeting of the Lutheran Synod in South Carolina and Adjacent States—nearly 30 years before it was chartered as a college by the State of South Carolina. At that 1828 meeting, the Rev. John Bachman, President of the Synod, recommended the establishment of a seminary to train Lutheran ministers. The following year the Synod followed his advice and voted to establish a seminary and classical academy.
The new seminary-academy opened its doors in February 1831 near Pomaria, SC (about 15 miles from the College's present location); it moved to neighboring Lexington in 1834 and remained there for over 20 years.
In 1854 the Synod voted to make the institution a degree-granting college, in 1855 to move it to Newberry, and in 1856, just before the granting of the charter, to name it Newberry College. A preparatory department opened in 1858, and the College and Seminary began operation in February 1859.
It prospered until the Civil War when nearly all the faculty and students were called into military service. At the end of the war, the only college building was occupied by federal troops. In 1868, as a result of the physical condition of the building, the military occupation, and the depletion of the endowment funds, the College faced a severe financial crisis. St. John's Lutheran church in Walhalla, SC, in the northwestern corner of the state, offered the College a new home. In 1877, through the efforts of Newberry residents, the College returned to its original site in Newberry.
The Synod discontinued operating the Seminary for several years, but in 1884 reopened it again at Newberry where it remained until 1898. That year the Seminary moved to Mt. Pleasant, SC, and in 1911 to its present location in Columbia, SC.
The College has maintained its association with the Lutheran Church. Today, Newberry is affiliated with the South Carolina, Southeastern, Florida-Bahamas, and Caribbean Synods of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA).
Our Leadership
Dr. Maurice William Scherrens
Newberry College's 22nd President
Inaugurated August 13, 2012
When Dr. Maurice William Scherrens assumed the mantle of leadership at Newberry College, he took on the challenges of an institution feeling the strain of the frequent leadership changes and financial challenges. Scherrens’ distinctive blend of collaborative spirit, steely determination and ardent enthusiasm have reinvigorated a College that was eager to rebuild and renew. Scherrens assembled a leadership team of highly qualified individuals who, fueled by his energy and vision, achieved remarkable progress in a short period of time. They achieved record high new student enrollment, earned full affirmation of accreditation by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC) and launched the first comprehensive campaign in college history.
Maurice Scherrens earned his Doctorate in Higher Education (Ed.D.) from the University of Southern California; Juris Doctor (JD) from George Washington University; and both a Master of Business Administration (MBA) and a Bachelor of Business Administration from Central Michigan University. He is the former Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at George Mason University, where he also taught an ethics course and a graduate finance course. Additionally, he was selected CFO of the Year for large, nonprofit organizations in 2009 by Virginia Business Magazine. He and his wife, Dr. Sandy Scherrens, have four children.
"Attending Newberry College is a game changer for our students. They may come from many different circumstances and walks of life, but we teach them to DREAM BIG. We meet them wherever they are and get them where they need to be to make their dreams a reality."
Dr. Maurice Scherrens
The President's Council
This honorable team is made up of reliable leaders who keep Newberry College running smoothly. Please feel free to contact them.
Christopher Harris
Dean of Enrollment Management
Scott Joyner
Vice President for Advancement
Sid Parrish
Vice President of Institutional Effectiveness and Strategic Initiatives
Ralph Patterson
Director of Athletics
Sandra Rouse
Dean of Students
Maurice Scherrens
President
Bobbie Sides
Chief of Staff
Ernie Worman
Campus Chaplain and Director of Church Relations
Kathy Worster
Vice President of Administrative Affairs, Chief Financial Officer
Mike Beggs
Associate Professor of Religion, Faculty Council Chair, Faculty Representative to Board of Trustees
Robert Best
Chairman
Barbara Smith Carey
Member At-Large
Joel Carter
ELCA South Carolina Synod Representative
Joyce (Roof) Carter
Alumni Board of Managers Representative
Joe "Trey" Castles
Member At-Large
Jimmie Coggins
Member At-Large
Barbara Davis
Member At-Large
Jeanette Davis
Member At-Large
Larry DiBiase
Member At-Large
Jean Haggard
Newberry Foundation Board of Visitors Representative
Jon "Shot" Hart
Treasurer, ELCA Southeastern Synod Representative
Eddie Havird
Member At-Large
Robert James
Member At-Large
Fred B. Johnston
Member At-Large
Hugo A. "Hap" Pearce
Chairman
Angie Rachels
Public Services Librarian
Frank Snyder
Member At-Large
Kevin Steelman
Member At-Large
William C. Steen
Member At-Large
Joe Trainor
ELCA South Carolina Synod Representative
Eric Wells
Vice Chair
Misty West
Member At-Large
Mark Wilhelm
ELCA Representative
Herman Yoos
ELCA Synodical Representative
Lenna C. Young
Secretary
Trustee Emeritus
William "Wick" Ashburn
Trustee Emeritus
Raymond Caughman
Trustee Emeritus
James Gerding
Trustee Emeritus
Dan Page
Trustee Emeritus
Mike Reid
Trustee Emeritus
John VanDuys
Trustee Emeritus
David Vorpagel
Trustee Emeritus
Billy Walker
Trustee Emeritus
Billye West
Trustee Emeritus
Ed West
Trustee Emeritus
John Yates
Trustee Emeritus
Publications
Click the image below to read our 2015-2016 Viewbook fullscreen.
