OUR HISTORY

Shipley was founded in 1894 by three sisters, Hannah, Elizabeth, and Katharine Shipley, to prepare students for Bryn Mawr College.

History of The Shipley School

How Three Sisters Sparked a Century of Change

The Shipleys, strong-minded and well-educated Quaker ladies, believed firmly in what was then a controversial idea—education for women. Their establishment was to be far more than a finishing school. In the fall of 1894, when the School opened with six students and nine faculty members, a philosophy of education was established that would guide the School for over a hundred years, up to the present time.

In their first catalogue, the Shipley sisters stated that it would “be their aim to fit [the student] to enter college with a mind trained to habits of scientific study and a character qualified, in as far as possible, to receive the highest culture.” That mission, rephrased for successive generations, has remained. We have always taught critical thinking. The School was and is concerned with character development.

By 1950, the School was enrolling some 340 students, one third of whom were in Pre-School through Grade Seven. Half of the Upper School students were boarders from all over the country, as well as Europe, Asia, and Latin America. Shipley graduates were going to colleges beyond Bryn Mawr—to the other traditional women’s colleges as well as coeducational schools.

Equipped to Adapt

Over the years, the School added land, buildings, playing fields, science labs, gymnasiums, and a theater. But the aims expressed in the 1950 catalogue had not changed much since 1894:

“Each girl's development as a useful, interesting, happy, and increasingly mature person is considered of first importance. Intellectual curiosity and a sense of individual responsibility are encouraged in every way.”

In the 1970s and ’80s Shipley underwent two dramatic changes. It started accepting boys and it closed the boarding department. The last boarding students graduated in 1982 and by 1984 the School was fully coeducational, with equal numbers of boys and girls. Over time we have augmented our traditional teaching methods and facilities with growing technological expertise, tools, and facilities of which the three Shipley sisters could never have dreamed.

For over a hundred years, Shipley and its mission have made the changes to adapt to a world unforeseen in 1894. We have always known that our students would need to be equipped to deal with constant challenges and change. It has been and continues to be our mandate to prepare them for their future.