Georgetown University

Georgetown University is a Catholic institution of higher learning that was founded in 1789 by John Carroll, Archbishop of Baltimore.

Carroll was the first Catholic bishop in what is now the United States, and cousin of Charles Carroll, the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence.

Since 1805, Georgetown has been strongly associated with the Jesuit order. However, the governance of the school has always been independent of the Catholic Church. Today, the majority of Georgetown students are not Catholic.

Georgetown was a relatively small, religious-training college until after the Civil War. In the 1870s, Patrick Francis Healey, a Jesuit priest with Irish and African ancestry, undertook a major expansion and reform of the university on the model of the modern, secular, German research university. Healey’s tenure is sometimes referred to as Georgetown’s “second founding.”

Today, Georgetown is one of the largest Catholic institutions of higher learning in the US, with a student body of about 19,000.

Georgetown has produced many famous individuals in American and international media and public life, including:

• King of Jordan, Abdullah II
• Former President of the Philippines, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo
• Former President of the US, Bill Clinton
• Current President of Colombia, Iván Duque Márquez
• Current US Senator, Dick Durbin
• King of Spain, Felipe VI
• Former Prime Minister of Lebanon, Saad Hariri
• Current US Representative, Steny Hoyer
• Current US Representative, Hakeem Jeffries
• TV journalist, David Muir
• Current US Senator, Lisa Murkowski
• TV journalist, Norah O’Donnell
• Former US Supreme Court Justice, Antonin Scalia
• Journalist, Maria Shriver
• TV journalist and political commentator, Greta Van Susteren

Among other distinguished Georgetown-associated individuals, we may note:

• Mathematician, Michael Banchoff
• Actor, Eileen Brennan
• Actor, Bradley Cooper
• Biophysicist, Karen Fleming
• TV personality, Savannah Guthrie
• Philosopher, Rom Harré
• Actor, TV producer, Nick Kroll
• Actor, screenwriter, Brit Marling
• Former US foreign service officer, current Georgetown Professor of International Affairs, John Negroponte
• Comedian, screenwriter, film director, Carl Reiner
• Neuroscientist, Solomon Snyder
• CFO of Facebook, David Wehner