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Navarro College

Former names	Navarro Junior College (1946–1974)
Type	Public community college
Established	1946
District President	Kevin Fegan
Students	10,000+
Location	Corsicana, Texas, U.S. 32°04′34″N 96°29′55″W / 32.0761°N 96.4987°W / 32.0761; -96.4987
Sporting affiliations	NJCAA – Southwest
Mascot	Bulldogs
Website	www.navarrocollege.edu

Navarro College is a public community college in Texas with its main campus in Corsicana and branches in Mexia, Midlothian, and Waxahachie. The college has an annual student enrollment of more than 9,000 students.

The Corsicana campus has strong ties with Texas A&M University–Commerce which has branches at the Navarro College campuses in Corsicana.

History

In spring 1946, a group of local citizens met to form a steering committee for the purpose of establishing a junior college in Navarro County. In a general election held July 16, 1946, voters approved the creation of Navarro Junior College and authorized a county tax to help finance the institution. In that same election, voters chose a seven-member board of trustees to govern the college. The first students began classes in September 1946. Most of the 238 members of that first student body were returning veterans from World War II taking advantage of assistance available under the newly enacted GI Bill of Rights. The first campus of Navarro College was the site of the Air Activities of Texas, a World War II primary flight school located six miles (10 km) south of Corsicana.

In 1951, the campus was moved to its present location, a 47-acre (19 ha) tract west of downtown Corsicana on Texas State Highway 31.

In 1974, the college broadened its philosophy and purpose to encompass the comprehensive community-based educational concept, adding occupational education programs and implementing new education concepts including individualized and self-paced instruction and the use of audio-tutorial instructional media. In keeping with the new educational role, the word "junior" was dropped from the institution's name, and the official name Navarro College was adopted by the board of trustees. In an attempt to address the growing needs of its service area, which consists of Navarro, Ellis, Freestone, Limestone, and Leon counties, the college began offering courses in various locations in those areas in the early 1970s and eventually established two permanent centers, Navarro College South at Mexia and the Ellis County Center at Waxahachie. Later, a third and fourth off-campus centers were added in Midlothian and Fairfield.

2014 Ebola controversy

In October 2014, Navarro College received criticism for sending admission rejection letters to two prospective students from Nigeria because the college was "not accepting international students from countries with confirmed Ebola cases." Nigeria was identified by the World Health Organization through the summer of 2014 with multiple confirmed cases of Ebola, but there had been no new Ebola cases (since early September). The rejected applicants lived in Ibadan, Nigeria, approximately 80 miles from Lagos, where the most recent infected cases were identified. The college offered an explanation on October 13, stating that the rejections were not a result of fears of Ebola, but that its international department had recently been restructured to focus on recruiting students from China and Indonesia. On October 16, college Vice-president Dewayne Gragg issued a new statement, contradicting the previous explanation and confirming that there had indeed been a decision to "postpone our recruitment in those nations that the Center for Disease Control and the U.S. State Department have identified as at risk."

Campus

The Corsicana campus has expanded to 103 acres (42 ha) with 23 buildings. It is home to the Cook Education Center, which houses a 60-foot-diameter (18 m) dome planetarium with seating for more than two hundred, tied with the University of Texas at Arlington for the largest planetarium in Texas. The Cook Education Center also contains the Pearce Collections Museum, home to many American Civil War artifacts as well as a western art collection.

Organization and administration

As defined by the Texas Legislature, the official service area of Navarro College includes all of Ellis, Freestone, Leon, Limestone, and Navarro counties.

Academics

Navarro is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. The accreditation was given in 1954 and reaffirmed in 1964, 1974, 1985, 1995 and again in 2006.

Waxahachie Global High School is partnered with Navarro College, and set up in a way that students at Global can take classes at Navarro. Thus they can graduate from high school with an associate degree or transferable credits to a 4-year university along with their high school diploma.

Athletics

Navarro's athletics teams, nicknamed The Bulldogs, compete in the Southwest Junior College Conference of the NJCAA. Navarro offers athletic scholarships in the following sports for men: football, basketball, baseball and for women: soccer, softball, volleyball. In 2011, the baseball team won the NJCAA Junior College World Series in Grand Junction, Colorado. The Bulldogs beat Central Arizona College, 6–4, on J.T. Files' walk-off home run in the tenth inning.

• Perry D. "Peno" Graham Field (baseball)

Cheerleading

The Bulldogs also have a strong reputation for their coed cheer team. Since the year 2000, Coach Monica Aldama has led the program to 16 NCA National Championships in the junior college division, as well as six "Grand National" designations (a status awarded to the team with the highest overall score in competition). In 2020, the squad became the subject of a Netflix docuseries called Cheer.

Notable people

• Jerry Harris, former Navarro College cheerleader, sex offender
• Willis Adams, NFL player
• Eddie Brown, NFL player
• Keith Burns, NFL player
• Gabi Butler, Navarro College cheerleader signed to WWE
• Keo Coleman, NFL player
• Byron Cook, state representative from Navarro County
• Chris Davis, MLB player
• DeMarcus Faggins, NFL player
• Wasila Diwura-Soale, Ghanaian soccer player
• Al Fontenot, NFL player
• Cameron Giles, played basketball briefly, is now known as hip hop artist Cam'ron
• Aaron Glenn, NFL player
• JD Hammer (born 1994), former Major League Baseball pitcher for the Philadelphia Phillies
• Brock Holt, utility player for the Boston Red Sox
• Ray Jacobs, four-time NFL All-Star
• Durwood Keeton, American football player
• Jermane Mayberry, NFL player
• Stockar McDougle, NFL player
• Tano Tijerina, minor-league pitcher for the Milwaukee Brewers, 1993–1997, County Judge of Webb County, Texas, beginning January 1, 2015
• Pat Williams, NFL player
• J'Marcus Webb, NFL player
• Mark Wheeler, NFL player

References

1. History of Navarro College
2. "Navarro Partnership". Texas A&M University-Commerce. Archived from the original on September 27, 2007. Retrieved December 8, 2023.
3. "Navarro College History" Archived 2014-12-07 at the Wayback Machine Navarro College Website
4. ^ Dan Mangan. "Texas College Rejects Nigerian Applicants, Cites Ebola Cases - NBC News". NBCNews.com. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
5. ^ "Navarro College in Texas apologizes after rejecting Nigerian applicants over Ebola fears - The Washington Post". Washington Post. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
6. "Are the Ebola outbreaks in Nigeria and Senegal over? Ebola situation assessment". World Health Organization. Archived from the original on October 14, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
7. "Navarro College says in a new statement it will postpone recruitment of students from countries at risk for Ebola - Corsicana Daily Sun: Local News". Corsicana Daily Sun. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
8. "Polymers, protons and planets - UTA Magazine Online". Archived from the original on January 10, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
9. "Cook Center Planetarium". Retrieved October 17, 2014.
10. "The Pearce Museum". Retrieved October 17, 2014.
11. Texas Education Code, Section 130.189, "Navarro College District Service Area".
12. "Accredited, Candidate, and Applicant Institution List" Archived 2011-07-22 at the Wayback Machine Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, Page 24
13. "Navarro College Athletics". www.navarrocollege.edu. Retrieved June 12, 2016.
14. "Navarro College - Succeeding Together". Archived from the original on May 27, 2010. Retrieved June 24, 2009.
15. "New Netflix series profiles just how hardcore this Texas school's cheerleading squad can get". January 8, 2020.
16. "Who is Monica Aldama, the champion coach in Netflix's new docuseries 'Cheer'?". Newsweek. January 8, 2020.
17. Heching, Dan. "Cheer Team Navarro Wins 2022 National Collegiate Cheer and Dance Championships". Yahoo! Sport. Retrieved April 13, 2022.
18. Kormos, Michael (April 23, 2022). "Navarro College celebrates Cheer's championship victory". Corsicana Daily Sun. Retrieved March 18, 2023.
19. Stuever, Hank (January 8, 2020). "Netflix's 'Cheer' is the documentary that hard-working cheerleaders have long deserved". The Washington Post. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
20. "Naperville Man Arrested on Child Pornography Charge for Allegedly Enticing Underage Boy to Produce Sexually Explicit Videos". www.justice.gov. September 17, 2020. Retrieved July 8, 2022.
21. "Willis Adams". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
22. "Eddie Brown". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
23. "Keith Burns". databaseFootball.com. Archived from the original on August 19, 2012. Retrieved December 10, 2012.
24. "Keo Coleman". databaseFootball.com. Archived from the original on November 3, 2012. Retrieved December 10, 2012.
25. "Representative Byron Cook". Navarro News. Archived from the original on October 20, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
26. "Chris Davis Stats". Baseball Almanac. Retrieved December 10, 2012.
27. "De marcus Faggins". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 10, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
28. "LSU's New Graduate: Diwura-Soale Will Play In Fall". Navarro Bull Dogs. August 13, 2021. Retrieved October 6, 2021.
29. "Al Fontenot". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
30. "Aaron Glenn". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
31. "Brock Holt". Baseball-Reference. Retrieved April 11, 2015.
32. "Ray Jacobs". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
33. "DURWOOD KEETON". profootballarchives.com. Archived from the original on September 8, 2015. Retrieved May 16, 2015.
34. "Jermane Mayberry". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
35. "Stockar Mcdougle". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
36. "Meet Tano". tanoforcountyjudge.com. Archived from the original on April 28, 2014. Retrieved April 27, 2014.
37. "Pat Williams". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
38. "J'Marcus Webb Profile". The University of Arizona Wildcats Official Athletic Site. Retrieved October 17, 2014.
39. "Mark Wheeler". databasefootball.com. Archived from the original on October 22, 2014. Retrieved October 17, 2014.

External links

• Official website

v t e Community colleges in Texas
College districts	Alamo Colleges District Austin Community College District Blinn College Clarendon College Dallas College El Paso Community College Houston Community College System Laredo College Lone Star College System North Central Texas College San Jacinto College South Texas College Southwest Texas Junior College Tarrant County College Trinity Valley Community College Wharton County Junior College
Alamo Colleges	Northeast Lakeview Northwest Vista Palo Alto St. Philip's San Antonio
Dallas College	Brookhaven Cedar Valley Eastfield El Centro Mountain View North Lake Richland
Lone Star	CyFair Kingwood Montgomery North Harris Tomball
Independent	Amarillo Alvin Angelina Brazosport Central Texas Cisco Coastal Bend College of the Mainland Collin Del Mar Frank Phillips Galveston Grayson Hill Howard Jacksonville Kilgore Lee Lon Morris McLennan Midland Navarro Northeast Texas Odessa Panola Paris Ranger Remington South Plains Temple Texarkana Tyler Vernon Victoria Weatherford
See also: Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board

• Navarro College
• Community colleges in Texas
• Education in Ellis County, Texas
• Education in Limestone County, Texas
• Education in Navarro County, Texas
• Universities and colleges accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools
• Universities and colleges in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex
• Universities and colleges established in 1946
• 1946 establishments in Texas
• Corsicana, Texas
• Waxahachie, Texas
• NJCAA athletics
• Two-year colleges in the United States