The mission of Hope College is to educate students for lives of leadership and service in a global society through academic and co-curricular programs of recognized excellence in the liberal arts and in the context of the historic Christian faith.

OVERVIEW (updated 7/09)

Hope Occupies a special place in the vast array of educational opportunities offered in the United States. It makes its contribution to the vitality and diversity of American higher education through the distinctiveness of its educational philosophy and program. As a liberal arts college offering education within the context of the historic Christian faith, Hope is a place of open inquiry, acceptance of intellectual challenge, rigorous engagement with hard questions, and vigorous but civil discussion of different beliefs and understandings; in the words of the Covenant of Mutual Responsibilities between the Reformed Church in America and its colleges, it is a place characterized by "an atmosphere of search and confrontation that will liberate the minds, enhance the discernment, enlarge the sympathies, and encourage the commitments of all students entrusted to (it)." For more than a century, Hope has cherished the conviction that life is God's trust, a trust which each of us is called to personally activate by an insistent concern for intelligent involvement in the human community and its problems.

Hope's Reason for being is each individual student. It seeks to develop the growth of each student as a competent, creative, and compassionate person. Its design is to provide a complete opportunity for the fulfillment of each individual student, not only for his or her self-gratification, but also for what can be given to others in service to God and humanity.

Hope Believes that a vital faith, which provides both the incentive and dynamic for learning and living, is central to education and life.

Hope Welcomes capable men and women of all social and economic levels. Hope is interested in students who sincerely seek to enlarge their minds, to deepen their commitments, and to develop their capacities for service.

Hope Provides an adventure in learning and living, not only for knowledge and wisdom, but also for understanding, meaning, and purpose. As partners in this seeking fellowship, Hope students find a faculty of professionally distinguished scholars who have a genuine concern for the total development of each student. Hope's finest professors teach introductory as well as advanced courses. Independent work on a self-directed basis is encouraged.

Hope Offers a well-equipped and friendly environment. Campus life pivots around residence halls, which serve as social centers and provide congenial surroundings for students to learn with one another. The diversity of student backgrounds, geographic and ethnic origins, and personal interests adds variety and richness to the group living experience. The campus is accessible to students who are mobility impaired. Examples of all housing options (residence hall, apartment and cottage), as well as most major academic buildings, are accessible to mobility-impaired persons. Many co-curricular activities and cultural events provide a variety of rich opportunities for learning and personal development.

Hope Prepares men and women who are persons in their own rights — uncommon men and women who have a personal dignity based on intelligence, a sense of responsibility, and a deeply rooted faith. For more than a century, Hope has prepared alumni to go to the four corners of the world — alumni who have enriched their professions and humanity far out of proportion to their numbers. Hope graduates aim to go beyond specialization toward a synthesis of all learning in life.

ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE (updated 7/09)

Faculty Achievements
Hope in the News
Experts Guide
Press Releases

Hope has long been recognized as a leading educational institution whose alumni have gone on to achieve distinction in their chosen professions. Distinguished academic, religious, political and business leaders are among Hope's graduates.

Government and foundation grants to individuals, to departments and to the college demonstrate the quality of the institution: outside grants to departments and faculty have totaled more than $7.6 million in the past two years.

Hope tied for fourth nationally in the "Undergraduate research/Creative projects" category in the America’s Best Colleges 2003 guide published by U.S. News and World Report for its success in teaching through active learning; Hope continues to be named to the annual listing, although the schools are no longer ranked. In addition, the guide’s 2009 edition includes Hope among the top 100 liberal arts colleges in the nation.

The new edition of the book Colleges That Change Lives cites Hope as one of 40 “life-changing” colleges that are “outdoing the Ivies and the major universities in producing winners” and describes the college as a place that “raises higher education’s moral and intellectual levels."

The 2009 Fiske Guide to Colleges includes Hope as one of the country’s “best and most interesting” colleges and universities, noting that “Hope’s academic and athletic programs continue to grow and prosper,” and quoting one senior as observing that “Hope is a place where students are challenges to become better students, but, more importantly, better people."

Hope is among 50 colleges recommended by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute in its guide All-American Colleges: Top Schools for Conservatives, Old-Fashioned Liberals and People of Faith, which notes that “The students and faculty we spoke with confirm that the school walks its talk; Hope College is both academically serious and theologically earnest.”

Hope is one of only 10 church-related colleges and universities nationwide highlighted in the book Putting Students First: How Colleges Develop Students Purposefully. The institutions were included specifically for being “individually and collectively distinguished and distinctive in fostering holistic student development.”

Evidence of excellence abounds at Hope. For example, the Van Wylen Library was named the national winner in the college category of the 2004 “Excellence in Academic Libraries Award” presented by the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL). The award recognizes staff for programs that deliver exemplary services and resources to further the educational mission of the institution.

For the past four consecutive years, the college has been named one of the “101 Best and Brightest Companies to Work For” in West Michigan through a program coordinated by the Michigan Business and Professional Association and the National Association for Business Resources.

Hope College Theatre’s production of Rose and the Rime, which was written at the college, was one of only three full-length college- or university-staged plays in the country invited to be presented during the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival (ACTF) National Festival in Washington, D.C., in 2008.

Hope is the only private, four-year liberal arts college in the United States with national accreditation in art, dance, music and theatre. Hope is also the only college or university in Michigan where business students can participate in the George F. Baker Scholars Program, which provides a wide range of real-world experiences beyond the classroom.

Hope has one of the largest summer undergraduate research programs in the nation; each year, approximately 160 students participate in summer research at the college. A recent report by ResearchCrossroads found that Hope held more funding from the National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health than any other liberal arts college in Michigan. Hope has regularly held more grants through the NSF’s “Research Experiences for Undergraduates” (NSF-REU) program (four this year) than any other primarily-undergraduate institution nationwide, and more than all but a handful of major research institutions. Hope is the only college or university in the country to have received “Beckman Scholar Award” support for student research from the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation of Irvine, Calif., since the foundation began the program in 1998.

An ongoing interdisciplinary Hope service project focused on water quality and community health in the village of Nkuv, Cameroon, was one of only four programs named a finalist for the state’s 2008 Carter Partnership Award by Michigan Campus Compact. The project includes the departments of communication, education, engineering and nursing.

Hope was in the top-10 nationwide among small colleges and universities for 2008, according to the “Peace Corps Top Colleges and University 2009” listings.

Jorge Capestany, manager of the DeWitt Tennis Center, earned Master Professional Status with the Professional Tennis Registry (PTR), becoming only the ninth person worldwide to hold Master Pro distinction with both the PTR and the United States Professional Tennis Association (USPTA). Wilma Hart, who is coordinator of volunteer services and assistant to the Office of Student Life, received a Michigan Campus Compact Faculty/Staff Community Service-Learning Award. Lori Mulder, director of human resources, was elected to the board of the Michigan College and University Professional Association for Human Resources as president-elect. Brian Morehouse, coach of the women’s basketball team, passed 300 coaching wins and also wrote an article included in the book Chicken Soup for the Soul: Inside Basketball.

There is a wide diversity of honor societies at Hope. These organizations, open by invitation, give recognition to superior academic achievement and enable Hope's outstanding students to communicate with each other and discuss matters of mutual interest. Two national honor societies, Phi Beta Kappa and Mortar Board, are chartered at Hope. Hope received its Phi Beta Kappa charter in 1971, and is one of 276 institutions in the U.S. and only eight in the state of Michigan able to grant this distinction. Students are elected to Phi Beta Kappa in the spring of their senior year.

Hope has a strong commitment to those students that are admitted to its degree programs. This is demonstrated in the fact that its retention rates are excellent and that its graduation rates are very high. In a study done to demonstrate compliance with the Student Right-to-Know and Campus Security Act of 1992, the registrar reported that by 2008 Hope had graduated 73.2 percent of those students admitted as first-year students in the fall of 2002. This figure does not include those students admitted as transfers to Hope. Hope compares favorably with other highly selective institutions in the degree-completion rates of its first-year students.

Approximately one-third of Hope’s graduates enter graduate schools to pursue advanced training for careers in medicine, science, business, education, economics, the humanities, psychology, and all areas of the performing and fine arts. Many of these graduates have received national awards for advanced study in fields as diverse as chemistry, social psychology, foreign languages, history, biology, education and physics.

Hope graduates continue to realize a high success rate in their efforts to get into law school. In recent years, close to 90 percent of Hope students applying to accredited law schools in the United States were accepted. The schools to which they have been admitted include nationally ranked law schools—Columbia, Cornell, Duke, Georgetown, George Washington, Harvard, Michigan, Minnesota, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Ohio State, William and Mary, and Wisconsin—as well as highly regarded regional schools such as Chicago-Kent, Michigan State, Loyola-Chicago, Toledo, Valparaiso, Wayne State and others.

Hope premedical students have been accepted into medical schools at a rate well above the national average. For example, during the past 10 years (1999 through 2008), 90 percent of the Hope applicants whose grade point averages were 3.4 or above were accepted by medical schools. During that same period, another 45 students were accepted who had grade point averages below 3.4.

During the past 10 years (1998 through 2007), 89 percent of the Hope applicants with a grade point average of 3.2 or better were accepted into dental schools.

The college emphasizes a solid program in the liberal arts as a base for both life and career. Career planning and job placement are regarded as important facets of the college experience.

Hope is a member of the Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MIAA) and National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), Division III, and fields varsity teams for men and women in 18 sports. An active intramural program also is offered.

Mission & Vision Statement

* Higher Learning Commission - 30 North LaSalle Street, Suite 2400, Chicago, IL 60602-2504, 800-621-7440