| rdfs:comment | - While remaining partially true to its heritage and striving to tear down all the old crusty buildings on campus that contain any shred of actual character, Baylor has grown to almost 14,000 students. Its barely recognized academic divisions provide 146 baccalaureate degree programs at the undergraduate level, none of which actually have to do with Vision 2012. As a result, Vision 2012 seeks to charge these record-breaking numbers of students with as high a tuition as possible, therefore allowing only society's elite to come to the school.
- In 1841, 35 delegates to the Union Baptist Association meeting voted to adopt the suggestion of Rev. William Milton Tryon and R.E.B. Baylor to establish a Baptist university in Texas, then a self-declared republic still claimed by Mexico. Baylor, a Texas district judge and onetime U.S. Congressman and soldier from Alabama, became the school's namesake. During World War II, Baylor was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the V-12 Navy College Training Program which offered students a path to a Navy commission.
- Baylor University is a nationally ranked research institution, characterized as having "high research activity" by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The university provides a campus community for approximately 15,000 students by blending interdisciplinary research with an international reputation for educational excellence and a faculty commitment to teaching and scholarship. Baylor sponsors 19 varsity athletic teams and is a founding member of the Big 12 Conference.
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| abstract | - Baylor University is a nationally ranked research institution, characterized as having "high research activity" by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The university provides a campus community for approximately 15,000 students by blending interdisciplinary research with an international reputation for educational excellence and a faculty commitment to teaching and scholarship. Chartered in 1845 by the Republic of Texas through the efforts of Baptist pioneers, Baylor is the oldest continually operating university in Texas. Located in Waco, Baylor welcomes students from 50 states and more than 80 countries to study a broad range of degrees among its 11 nationally recognized academic divisions. Baylor sponsors 19 varsity athletic teams and is a founding member of the Big 12 Conference.
- In 1841, 35 delegates to the Union Baptist Association meeting voted to adopt the suggestion of Rev. William Milton Tryon and R.E.B. Baylor to establish a Baptist university in Texas, then a self-declared republic still claimed by Mexico. Baylor, a Texas district judge and onetime U.S. Congressman and soldier from Alabama, became the school's namesake. In the fall of 1844, the Texas Baptist Education Society petitioned the Congress of the Republic of Texas to charter a Baptist university. Republic President Anson Jones signed the Act of Congress on Feb. 1, 1845, officially establishing Baylor University. The founders built the original university campus in Independence, Texas. Rev. James Huckins, the first Southern Baptist missionary to Texas, was Baylor's first full-time fundraiser. He is considered the third founding father of the university. Although these three men are credited as being the founders of the university, many others worked to see the first university established in Texas and thus they were awarded Baylor's Founders Medal. The famous Texas revolutionary war leader and hero Sam Houston gave the first $5,000 donation to start the university. In 1854, Houston was also baptized by the Rev. Rufus Columbus Burleson, future Baylor President, in the Brazos River. In 1851, Baylor's second president Rufus Columbus Burleson decided to separate the students by gender, making the Baylor Female College an independent and separate institution. Baylor University became an all-male institution. During this time, Baylor thrived as the only university west of the Mississippi offering instruction in law, mathematics and medicine. Many of the early leaders of the Republic of Texas, such as Sam Houston, later sent their children to Baylor to be educated. Some of those early students were, Temple Lea Houston, son of President Sam Houston, a famous western gun-fighter and attorney. Along with Lawrence Sullivan "Sul" Ross famous Confederate General and later President of Texas A&M University. During the American Civil War, the Baylor president was George Washington Baines, maternal great-grandfather of the future U.S. President, Lyndon Baines Johnson. He worked vigorously to sustain the university during the Civil War, when male students left their studies to enlist in the Confederate Army and serve Texas in various military campaigns. Following the war, the city of Independence slowly declined, primarily caused by the rise of neighboring cities being serviced by the Santa Fe Railroad. Because Independence lacked a railroad line, university fathers began searching for a location to build a new campus. Beginning in 1885, Baylor University moved to Waco, Texas, a growing town on the railroad line. It merged with a local college called Waco University. At the time, Rufus Burleson, Baylor's second president, was serving as the local college's president. That same year, the Baylor Female College also was moved to a new location, Belton, Texas. It later became known as the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor. A Baylor College Park still exists in Independence in memory of the college's history there. Around 1887, Baylor University began readmitting women and became coeducational again. In 1900, three physicians founded the University of Dallas Medical Department in Dallas, although a university by that name did not exist. In 1903, Baylor University acquired the medical school, which became known as the Baylor College of Medicine, while remaining in Dallas. In 1943, Dallas civic leaders offered to build larger facilities for the university in a new medical center if the College of Medicine would surrender its denominational alliances with the Baptist state convention. The Baylor administration refused the offer and, with funding from the M. D. Anderson Foundation and others, moved the College of Medicine to Houston. In 1969, the Baylor College of Medicine became technically independent from Baylor University. During World War II, Baylor was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the V-12 Navy College Training Program which offered students a path to a Navy commission.
- While remaining partially true to its heritage and striving to tear down all the old crusty buildings on campus that contain any shred of actual character, Baylor has grown to almost 14,000 students. Its barely recognized academic divisions provide 146 baccalaureate degree programs at the undergraduate level, none of which actually have to do with Vision 2012. As a result, Vision 2012 seeks to charge these record-breaking numbers of students with as high a tuition as possible, therefore allowing only society's elite to come to the school. Recent additions to the application will label students in two categories: "A" and "B." Category "A" students will be labeled as such by parents' membership in such outstanding organizations as fraternity alumni associations, the Junior League, or the Baylor Bear Foundation, whose automobile sticker will be able to double as a parking pass for "A" students when they feel like parking in visitor slots. "A" students also include athletes, who will have the added bonus of registering before everyone else for compelling classes such as Rest and Relaxation and Swahili. Category "B" students only got in because of various scholarships or because some professor Bobby Sloan disliked during his tenure as university president thought they might do well here. They will eventually be priced out after Baylor completes more buildings in its 2012 quest to be like Hogwarts with Jesus.
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