At the start of the twentieth century, Reverend Joseph M. McCulloch of Greensboro conceived the idea of a church-affiliated-school and worked for almost a quarter century to realize this vision. In 1921, the Methodist Church voted in favor of his idea, and the city of High Point appropriated 60 acres of land and $100,000 to fund the school.
High Point College’s early years were financially difficult. Although there were only three buildings, nine faculty members and 122 students, classes began in September 1924. The financial situation turned bleak during the 1930’s and the Great Depression. Cuts in faculty salaries, budgetary restraints, indebtedness and bankruptcy in 1934 threatened the school’s survival. However, the institutional leadership under presidents Robert M. Andrews and Gideon I. Humphreys ushered in a period of growth and financial stability.
In the late 1930’s, new facilities were added including a gymnasium, the M. J. Wrenn Library, and the H. Albion Millis Stadium for sporting events. High Point University dissolved its debt in 1945 during the final year of World War 11 and hosted the 326th College Training Detachment of the U.S. Army. After the war, High Point rapidly expanded with the implementation of the GI Bill and the baby boomer generation of the 1940’s and 1950’s. In 1984, the Smith Library opened, and in 1987 a new men’s residence hall was established with 221 resident faculty.
High Point became an official university in the fall of 1991 and offered master’s degrees in business administration, management, and administration of nonprofit organizations. In late 1992, the school made facility additions for physical education, health, and athletic activities. At that time, the school consisted of 40 buildings surrounded by pristine landscape, 150 faculty members, and a wide range of daytime, evening and summer programs, ranging from education to business administration.
Even so, in the early 2000s, there was a sense that HPU was in decline, with stagnant enrollment and located in a city that had lost a great deal of its manufacturing. The university board hired its chairman to be president—Nido Qubein, a wealthy Lebanese-American businessman in High Point, known (among other things) for his motivational speeches. The result has been dramatic. Since Qubein became president in 2005, enrollment has gone up by 300 percent to around 6000 students (about 10 percent are graduate students). Its facilities have grown by purchasing or constructing 90 buildings. Qubein is one of the highest paid university presidents in the country. The school has helped revitalize the city of High Point.
David Mildenberg of Business North Carolina recently quoted Tom Ross, past president of the University of North Carolina System: “’High Point is as remarkable of a turnaround story as one can find in higher education,’ Ross says. ‘President Nido Qubein has done a remarkable job and surpassed what many doubters thought was possible. I can be included in that list of doubters. I didn’t see it happening.'”
Among its distinctions, High Point emphasize life skills—Qubein teaches a first-year course in basic skills, and each freshman is assigned a “success coach.”