In March Sojourner-Douglass College in Baltimore received notice from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education that it would lose its accreditation as of June 30. The commission said that inadequate financial resources was the primary reason that the college’s accreditation was revoked.
Sojourner-Douglass College was founded in 1972. While it was founded too late to be designated a historically Black college or university, Sojourner-Douglass College had a student body that was almost all Black and almost all women. This spring there were about 750 students enrolled at the college.
Now the college has filed a federal lawsuit against the accrediting agency saying it discriminated against the college in violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1867. The suit claims that the decision to revoke accreditation “was so arbitrary and capricious that it cannot be allowed lawfully to stand.”
As of this posting, the college’s website has been taken down.
