Roanoke College is a private, coeducational, four-year liberal-arts college located in Salem, Virginia, United States; a small suburban independent city adjacent to Roanoke, Virginia. Roanoke has approximately 2,100 students who represent approximately 40 states and 25 countries. The college offers 35 majors, 30 minors, 23 concentrations, and pre-professional programs in law, medicine, dentistry, engineering, and ministry. Roanoke awards bachelor's degrees in arts, science, and business administration and is one of 280 colleges with a chapter of the Phi Beta Kappa honor society. Roanoke is... an NCAA Division III school competing in the Old Dominion Athletic Conference. The college fields varsity teams in nine men's and ten women's sports. Roanoke's athletic nickname is Maroons and the mascot is Rooney, a maroon-tailed hawk. Roanoke College was founded in 1842 as a boys' preparatory school by Lutheran pastors David F. Bittle and Christopher C. Baughmann. Originally located in Augusta County near Staunton, the school was named Virginia Institute until chartered on January 30, 1845 as Virginia Collegiate Institute.
more