page_title: Dixie State University
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Dixie State University / History
caption_attribution_description: English: The Holland Centennial Commons and Clock Tower
context_page_description: Dixie State University is a public university in St. George, Utah, in the state's Dixie region. The university offers 4 master's degrees, 45 bachelor's degrees, 11 associate degrees, 44 minors, and 23 certificates/endorsements. As of Fall 2019, there are 11,193 students enrolled at DSU, and the university has a 80% acceptance rate. The student body is 56% female and 44% male, and DSU is in the top three for diversity in the state of Utah, with 23% of the student body being minority students.
  The institution began as St. George Stake Academy, founded in 1911 by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Later it became a state school of the Utah System of Higher Education. In February 2013, the former Dixie State College, as it had been known since 2000, officially became Dixie State University.
  DSU's 15 athletic teams compete in NCAA Division I and are collectively known as the Dixie State Trailblazers. The Trailblazers football team joined the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference in 2016, and the Women's Swimming team competes in the Pacific Collegiate Swim Conference, but DSU's 13 other teams belong to the PacWest Conference.
context_section_description: The institution was founded by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) on September 19, 1911, as St. George Stake Academy. In 1916, the academy, located in a region called "Utah's Dixie" by Brigham Young and local settlers, became Dixie Normal College, and then, in 1923, the name was changed to Dixie Junior College. In 1933, the LDS Church discontinued its support of the college, and rather than give up on it, the local citizenry came together and maintained the school's operation through donations and labor for two years.
  In 1935, the State Board of Education took over the funding for the school, but wanted to split the college students from the high school students, with the high school moving under the direction of Washington County. The community resisted, feeling that the approximate 200 college students and similar number of high school students needed to be combined to provide a good-sized student body for the many social and academic programs. Another concern was that the county did not have the funds to build a new high school.
  Between 1935 and 1963 there were close calls when various state leaders proposed closing the college, but the local citizens were fiercely loyal to the college and willing to donate to keep it alive. These local citizens, particularly the Dixie Education Association, raised the funds to purchase four blocks of land on 700 East and 100 South for a new campus. They presented that land to the state which, in turn, agreed to fund a few buildings for a new campus there. In 1957 the gymnasium was finished and by 1963 four other buildings were ready for college students with the high school students remaining on the downtown campus.
  On September 7, 2007, Dixie State College Board of Trustees members announced that Dixie State College of Utah would petition the University of Utah to become the University of Utah–St. George. The proposal was approved by the Dixie State College Board of Trustees on October 7, 2007, and by the University of Utah Board of Trustees on October 14, 2007; however, this did not come to fruition.
  In 2011, a bill was drafted for the review of the Utah State Legislature and the Utah State Governor to support Dixie State College's transition to university status.
  The institution contracted with a local advertising firm, Sorenson Advertising, to investigate names for the institution as a university and found that alumni overwhelmingly supported the name "Dixie" while less than half of faculty/staff supported the name "Dixie" (p. 48). Controversy over the name "Dixie" has arisen many times.
  In 2013, the Utah Legislature changed the status of the institution from a college to a university and named it Dixie State University. Governor Gary Herbert signed the bill into law in a ceremony on campus, calling the new university into existence on February 16, 2013. President Stephen Nadauld of Dixie State University and others recognized this step as the fulfillment of the dream of the original Mormon pioneers of the area to have a university for their communities. That same year the Board of Trustees approved a student driven proposed campus-wide tobacco ban. The ban prohibits all tobacco products, including electronic cigarettes. The ban went into effect on January 1, 2014.
  Also in 2013, Dixie State University student Indigo Klabanoff pushed for the creation of a sorority and its financial support. DSU did not approve it or the creation of clubs with Greek letters in their names (excepting honor societies), because they said introducing Greek Life properly requires significant funding and the inherent "partying" stereotype of a Greek system was not a culture they wanted to encourage on campus.
  In December 2014, theater professor Varlo Davenport received a notice of dismissal and termination of employment in connection with a student complaint of an alleged assault but because of his tenure was allowed to request a termination appeal hearing as outlined in DSU Policy. A reinstatement petition was started by students that ultimately garnered over 1,400 signatures, 
caption: DSU Holland Centennial Commons and Clock Tower
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