Quinnipiac University

What became Quinnipiac University was founded in 1929 by Samuel W. Tator, a business professor and politician. Phillip Troup, a Yale College graduate, another founder, was its first president, serving until his death in 1939. Tator's wife, Irmagarde Tator, a Mount Holyoke College graduate, also played a major role in the fledgling institution's nurturing as its first bursar. Additional founders were E. Wight Bakke, who later became a professor of economics at Yale, and Robert R. Chamberlain, who headed a furniture company.

The new institution was conceived in reaction to Northeastern University's abandonment of its New Haven, Connecticut, program at the onset of the Great Depression. Originally, it was located in New Haven and called the Connecticut College of Commerce. On opening its doors in 1929, it enrolled under 200, and its first graduating class comprised eight students. In 1935, the college changed its name to the Junior College of Commerce. In 1951, the institution was renamed Quinnipiac College, in honor of the Quinnipiac Indian tribe that once inhabited Greater New Haven. In 1952, the school relocated to a larger campus in New Haven, and also assumed administrative management of Larson College, a private women's college.

In 1966, Quinnipiac moved to its campus in the Mount Carmel section of Hamden, Connecticut, at the foot of Sleeping Giant Park. During the 1970s, Quinnipiac began to offer master's degrees.

Controversies

The university's official student newspaper is The Quinnipiac Chronicle. In 2007 and 2008, Quinnipiac briefly drew national attention over the university's control over the Chronicle and other aspects of students' speech after the then-editor of the Chronicle openly criticized a university policy that forbade the newspaper from publishing news online before it was published in print. Manuel Carreiro, Quinnipiac's vice president and dean of students, allegedly threatened to fire Braff for disagreeing with school policies. When former Chronicle staff members founded Quad News, an independent online paper, university officials allegedly instructed varsity coaches, staff and athletes not to speak to Quad News reporters.

On July 21, 2010, a federal judge ruled that Quinnipiac violated Title IX of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by failing to provide equal treatment to women's athletic teams. The judge, Stefan Underhill, determined that Quinnipiac's decision to eliminate the women's volleyball team as well as its attempt to treat cheerleading as a competitive sport and its manipulation of reporting with regard to the numbers of male and female athletes amounted to unlawful discrimination against female students. Underhill ruled that competitive cheerleading was currently too underdeveloped and unorganized and then ordered that the school maintain its volleyball program for the 2010–11 season.

In 2015, the university reached a settlement with the federal government over allegations that the university violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by "placing a student who had been diagnosed with depression on a mandatory medical leave of absence without first considering options for the student's continued enrollment." The university agreed to pay the former student over $32,000 to pay off her student loan and compensate her for "emotional distress, pain and suffering". The university also had agreed to implement a new policy of nondiscrimination against applicants or students on the basis of disability, examine changes that will allow students with mental health disabilities to participate in educational programs while seeking mental health treatment and provide additional ADA training for all staff.

In 2020, two students reached a $2.5 million settlement with the federal government, alleging the shift in remote learning during the COVID-19 pandemic devalued the promised educational experience. The students alleged the virtual environment deprived them of promised in-person instruction, campus events, and relationship building. The school denied these allegations, saying virtual instruction was in the best interest due to public health and safety concerns. Quinnipiac University students who attended the college during this time received a portion of the $2.5 million payout.