Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private research university in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789 as Georgetown College, the university has grown to comprise nine undergraduate and graduate schools, among which are the School of Foreign Service, School of Business, Medical School, and Law School. Located on a hill above the Potomac River, the school's main campus is identifiable by its flagship Healy Hall, a National Historic Landmark. Georgetown offers degree programs in forty-eight disciplines, enrolling an average of 7,500 undergraduate and 10,000 post-graduate students from more than 130 countries.
History of Georgetown University
Carroll didn't seek civil recognition for Georgetown until after the suppression of the international Society ended in 1814. Instead of a state charter, he went to the federal government, then directly in charge of the District of Columbia. William Gaston, now a Congressman, sponsored the legislation for a congressional charter, which passed the Thirteenth Congress and Georgetown received the first federal university charter on March 1, 1815, signed into law by President James Madison. This allowed Georgetown to grant academic degrees, and the college's first two recipients, a pair of brothers from New York City named Charles and George Dinnies, were awarded the degree of bachelor of arts in 1817. Graduate degrees were first awarded in 1821, and other Jesuit schools conferred degrees under Georgetown's charter for many years afterward. In 1833, the Holy See empowered Georgetown to confer degrees in philosophy and theology.