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The Rise · HBCU

Cheyney University of Pennsylvania

Cheyney, Pennsylvania · Public · Four-year · Founded 1837

www.cheyney.edu · official site

Founding

Cheyney University of Pennsylvania dates its founding to February 25, 1837, and states that it is the nation's first historically Black college or university, established through the bequest of Richard Humphreys, a Quaker philanthropist. Cheyney State College became Cheyney University of Pennsylvania in 1983, the oldest institution in the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education.

Source: The First HBCU, Cheyney University of Pennsylvania, read 2026-09-14.

As the Department of Education lists it

Campus address
1837 University Circle, Cheyney, PA 19319-0200
Control
Public
IPEDS unit id
211608
OPE id
00331700
Federal student aid
Participates in Title IV federal student aid
Title III Part B list, FY 2026
Listed
On the map
Placed on the Ledger map by an exact match from the U.S. Census Bureau geocoder on 2026-09-14: 1837 UNIVERSITY CIR, CHEYNEY, PA, 19319. See it on the Ledger map.

No enrollment figure is published on this page. The Ledger prints one only with a dated NCES citation, and none is attached to this record.

Sources

  1. U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. IPEDS Institutional Characteristics, Directory information (HD2024), 2024-25 provisional data collection. Unit id 211608. https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/datacenter/data/HD2024.zip. File dated 2025-09-21.
  2. U.S. Department of Education, Office of Postsecondary Education. Higher Education Programs Eligibility Matrix, sheet 'HBCU', dated 2026-06-08. https://www.ed.gov/media/document/fy-2026-higher-education-programs-eligibility-matrix-june-8-2026-114185.xlsx.
  3. The First HBCU, Cheyney University of Pennsylvania. https://cheyney.edu/who-we-are/the-first-hbcu/. Read 2026-09-14.
  4. U.S. Census Bureau Geocoder, batch address service, benchmark Public_AR_Current. https://geocoding.geo.census.gov/geocoder/.

Machine-readable: /api/v1/hbcus/cheyney-university-of-pennsylvania · All HBCUs

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