In 2017, the institutions consolidated and assumed the name and branding of Albany State University, with the Darton College campus becoming the site of Albany State University's Darton College of Health Professions. Enrollment was expected to be around 9,000 students. However, the combined enrollment decreased significantly. Fall 2013 enrollments were 6,195 for Darton State College and 4,260 for Albany State University while Fall 2017 enrollments for the new combined Albany State University were 6,615. This represents a 27% decrease over that period. Due to the consolidation with Darton, Albany State became the largest HBCU in the state of Georgia and one of the largest in the United States. The college played a significant role in the Civil Rights Movement in the early 1960s. Many students from the school, Black improvement organizations, and representatives from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) came together to create the Albany Movement. The movement brought prominent civil rights leaders to the town including Martin Luther King Jr and resulted in the arrests of more than 1,000 black protestors. Among the very first to be arrested were students from Albany State. On November 22, 1961, Blanton Hall and Bertha Gober entered the white waiting room of the Albany bus station to buy tickets home for the Thanksgiving holiday. Refusing to leave after being ordered to do so, police arrested them both. Albany State President William Dennis, fearful of losing his position, immediately suspended and eventually expelled the students. This action engendered a great deal of animosity from the black community and the student body. Gober would continue in the civil rights movement as one of the SNCC's Freedom Singers and write the group's anthem. Bernice Johnson Reagon, another Albany State student who left school to work with the SNCC, would later form the well-known a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock. On December 10, 2011, thirty two of the students who were expelled were granted honorary degrees. The school awarded thirty one honorary baccalaureate degrees and one honorary doctorate – that to Bernice Johnson Reagon. A noted cultural historian, Reagon was also the commencement speaker. Joseph Winthrop Holley served as President of the school from 1903–1943. He was succeeded by Aaron Brown (1943–1954), William Dennis (1954–1965), Thomas Miller Jenkins (1965–1969), Charles Hayes (1969–1980), Billy C. Black (1980–1996), Portia Holmes Shields (1996–2005), Everette J. Freeman (2005 – 2013), Art Dunning (2015-2018), and Marion Ross Fredrick (2018-).