Liberty University


Liberty University, known simply as Liberty, is a conservative, private evangelical Christian university in Lynchburg, Virginia, United States. It is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention of Virginia. Founded in 1971 by Jerry Falwell Sr. and Elmer L. Towns as Lynchburg Baptist College, Liberty is among the world's largest Christian universities and one of the largest private non-profit universities in the United States by total student enrollment.
Liberty University consists of 17 colleges, including the Helms School of Government and the Rawlings School of Divinity. Most of its enrollment is in online courses; in 2020, the university enrolled about 15,000 in its residential program and 80,000 online. Its high number of students can be explained in particular by its tuition fees, which are among the lowest in the United States. Liberty's athletic teams compete in Division I of the NCAA and are collectively known as the Liberty Flames. Their athletics program joined Conference USA as a full member in 2023.
The university requires undergraduate students to take three evangelical biblical studies classes. Its honor code, called the "Liberty Way", prohibits premarital sex, cohabitation, any kind of romantic relationship between members of the same sex, and alcohol use. It places a strong emphasis on creationism. Liberty University is perceived as a "bastion of the Christian right", playing a prominent role in Republican politics under Falwell and his son and successor Jerry Falwell Jr.; Falwell Jr. left in 2020 amid allegations of sexual and professional impropriety and was later sued by the university. Dondi E. Costin is the current president of Liberty University.
Liberty University has experienced rapid financial growth, particularly under Jerry Falwell Jr., with assets rising from $259 million in 2007 to over $2.5 billion by 2020, largely driven by online tuition and aggressive facility expansion financed through bonds, though it spends a relatively small portion of revenue on instruction and relies heavily on federal funding. Its marketing and recruitment practices have been criticized for aggressive sales tactics, targeting military members for federal aid, and downplaying the mandatory Christian curriculum, while sponsorships and high-profile political engagements, especially with Republican leaders and Donald Trump, have bolstered its public profile. The university has faced multiple controversies, including allegations of nepotism, sexual assault mismanagement, racial and LGBTQ discrimination, censorship, and regulatory violations, culminating in a $14 million Clery Act fine in 2024 for systemic underreporting of campus crimes.

History

Establishment

The school was founded as Lynchburg Baptist College in 1971 by televangelist Jerry Falwell Sr. and Elmer L. Towns. Falwell, already a pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church, served as the first chancellor of the school. From 1979 to the late 1980s, Falwell Sr. also headed the Moral Majority, a right-wing political organization.
The school changed its name to Liberty Baptist College in 1976. Officials said the change aimed to distance the school from the name Lynchburg, which is often mistakenly associated with lynching; co-founder Towns also said that Falwell Sr. wanted to use the name "Liberty" to ride the enthusiasm for the Bicentennial of the United States.
The name changed again in 1984, to Liberty University. In 1985, the university launched a distance-learning program by mailing VHS tapes to students; this was the forerunner to Liberty University's current online program. In 1987, Liberty University's 501 tax-exempt status was formally recognized by the IRS.
In its early decades, the university was kept afloat financially by major donors. The university was placed on probation multiple times in the 1990s by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools due to heavy debt loads. In 1990, the university's debt totaled $110 million; by 1996, this had decreased to $40million. In 1994, Sun Myung Moon's Women's Federation for World Peace funneled $3.5 million to Liberty University.

Modern history

In 2004, Liberty University named its School of Government for Jesse Helms, a former U.S. senator from North Carolina and a Falwell family friend.
In 2005, Barron's Profiles of American Colleges ranked undergraduate admission to LU as "competitive", its fourth-highest of six ranks. When high-speed Internet connections became more widespread around 2005, Liberty began to offer online courses to a larger adult population.
After Falwell Sr. died in 2007, his son Jerry Falwell Jr. became the university's second chancellor and fourth president. At the time, the university listed $259 million in assets.
Liberty University Online Academy was formed in 2007, serving 23 students.
In 2009, Liberty University withdrew official recognition of the student Young Democrats club, saying that the club's political positions, including support of abortion rights, conflicted with the school's. The school's College Republicans club remains officially recognized.
In 2010, Liberty students received about $445 million in federal financial aid money, the highest total of any school in Virginia and one of the highest in the country. A 56 percent increase over the previous year, the money was mostly in the form of student loans, but also included some grants and other forms of aid.
In 2011, Liberty blocked campus internet access to the website of a local newspaper, the News & Advance, after it reported that the university received more federal financial aid than any other school in Virginia. Falwell Jr. refused to say why the block was imposed, said it was unrelated to anything published in the newspaper, and said that the News & Advance had been blocked on campus before. The block was lifted one day after the financial-aid article was published.
, the university's endowment stood at more than $1billion and gross assets exceeded $2billion.
In November 2020, Liberty University graduate and athletics booster Bob Good won a seat in the US House of Representatives, making him the first Liberty graduate to be in the House.
On March 31, 2023, Dondi Costin was named president of Liberty University.
Liberty University is a member of the advisory board of Project 2025, a collection of conservative and right-wing policy proposals from the Heritage Foundation to reshape the United States federal government and consolidate executive power should the Republican nominee win the 2024 presidential election.

Presidents

Campus

The 17-story, 245-foot Freedom Tower, completed in February 2018, is the tallest building in Lynchburg. The tower holds a 25-bell carillon that includes a replica of the Liberty Bell.
The Hancock Welcome Center celebrated its ribbon cutting ceremony on December 7, 2012. It is a three-level, 33,000-square-foot Jeffersonian-style building featuring an atrium, boardroom, theater, lounges, a banquet hall, several smaller counseling rooms, and a patio with a view of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The Jerry Falwell Sr. Center: Inspiring Champions for Christ, opening in 2023, will be attached to the Hancock Welcome Center.
Liberty University's Center for Music & Worship hosts the Miss Virginia beauty competition which sends the winner of the state to represent it in the Miss America Pageant.
Construction was completed in August 2009 on the Liberty Mountain Snowflex Centre, a synthetic ski slope featuring Snowflex; the centre was designed by England's Briton Engineering. The first of its kind in the United States, it includes beginner, intermediate, and advanced slopes.
The Observatory Center opened in spring 2013 next to the Equestrian Center. The dome has a classroom that can fit up to 20 people. It houses a RC Optical Systems Truss Ritchey-Chrétien and several Celestron CPC 800 8-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescopes on pedestals, able to roll out under a roof. The observatory serves three purposes: instruction, public nights and research. Student Activities controls the use of the observatory and is open to all students.
In 2018, Liberty University opened a $3.2 million on-campus shooting range to train students to protect themselves against shooters and terrorists.

Libraries and museums

Jerry Falwell Library

The four-story, 170,000-square-foot Jerry Falwell Library opened in January 2014 with more than 250,000 items and room for another 170,000. They are accessible via a robot-assisted storage and retrieval system, which locates requested items within a large storage room and delivers them to the front desk. There are 150 public computers throughout the building for electronic archive research. The library has group study rooms, writable walls, balconies, terraces, and a vegetative roof. At its entrance stands a 24-foot media wall, powered by three Microsoft Kinect units and integrated using a custom program that allows visitors to scroll through university news, browse pictures contributed from students, and learn about upcoming university events.
The $50 million library is part of a larger $500 million building and expansion plan announced by Liberty University.

National Civil War Chaplains Museum

The National Civil War Chaplains Museum contains exhibits about clergy members and religious activity during the Civil War era. It is the only museum in the nation devoted to this purpose. The mission of the museum is to "educate the public about the role of chaplains, priests, and rabbis and religious organizations in the Civil War; to promote the continuing study of the many methods of dissemination of religious doctrine and moral teachings during the War; to preserve religious artifacts, and to present interpretive programs that show the influence of religion on the lives of political and military personnel." A 501 organization, the museum exists within the Jerry Falwell Library.
The museum commemorates Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish chaplains, and houses publications and artifacts from both the Union and Confederate militaries. There are several areas in the museum that are given special attention including: