Ashland University was founded in 1878 as Ashland College and achieved university status in 1989 because of the many undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs that were being offered. The University is affiliated with The Brethren Church denomination and has the second largest enrollment of any Brethren college.

There are about 6,000 students and a faculty over 200. It consists of four colleges: Arts and Sciences, Business and Economics, Education, and Ashland Theological Seminary. The main campus of 135 acres is located in the city of Ashland, with other campus locations in northern Ohio. Ashland is strongly committed to Christian values, exhibiting a Mission Statement and Vision Statement.

Grace College was founded in 1948 and the youngest of all Brethren colleges. It is associated with Grace Theological Seminary and affiliated with the Fellowship of Grace Brethren Churches. The 180 arce campus of college and seminary is located in Winona Lake, Indiana. The College offers 45 majors to an enrollment of about 1,200 students with a student to faculty ratio of about 19 to 1.

You will find an accelerated program in which you can graduate in three years and the really ambitious may receive their bachelors and masters degrees in four. Grace is deeply committed to the spiritual aspect of student life: "You‘ll discover that worship goes much deeper than singing and swaying. We worship with our whole life, and at graduation, you‘ll walk with more than just a degree. You‘ll have a biblical worldview that will serve you without fail at the most pressing times in your personal and professional life."

Bridgewater College evolved from the former Spring Creek Normal School, which was founded in 1880 under the leadership of Daniel Flory. The school was originally located at Spring Creek, Virginia, but moved a few miles east to Bridgewater in 1882, just in time for the fall semester.

It was incorporated by the State of Virginia in 1884, the name of the school was changed to Bridgewater College in 1889 after revising it's charter, and became an accredited four-year college by the Virginia State Board of Education in 1916. It is a co-educational institution with an enrollment near 1,000.

Elizabethtown College was chartered in 1899 and officially opened for classes on November 13, 1900, at the corner of South Market and Bainbridge streets in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania. Elders of the German Baptist Brethren of Pennsylvania Eastern district were invited in 1898 to attend a meeting for the expressed purpose of founding an institution of higher education, and a committee subsequently recommended Elizabethtown as their choice location. The school was moved to the east side of town in January of the following year, and came under ownership of the Eastern Pennsylvania district of the Church of the Brethren in 1917.

For the first two decades it also operated an academy for high-school students, and received full accreditation for issuing baccalaureate degrees from the State Council on Education in 1921. Several building and renovation initiatives during the 1950s 1960s greatly increased the size of the campus. This strengthened its academic program, which offers study in almost forty major pursuits. On campus you will also find related interests such as the Young Center for the Study of Anabaptist and Pietist Groups. It is a co-educational institution with an enrollment near 1,500.

Juniata College is the oldest of the six colleges that are affiliated with the Church of the Brethren. It was the venture of three central Pennsylvania men of the Brumbaugh family who advocated the establishment of an institution of higher educational for Brethren.

It officially opened for classes on April 17, 1876 as the Huntingdon Normal School and then changed to Brethren's Normal College two years later, and finally to Juniata College in 1894 (from the nearby Juniata River). The school received full accreditation from the state of Pennsylvania in 1896. It is a co-educational institution with an enrollment near 1,300.

University of La Verne was founded by members of the Church of the Brethren under the name of Lordsburg College in 1891. The Church of the Brethren Pacific Southwest District (California - Arizona) took over the administration of the school in 1908, and both the name of the town and the college were changed to La Verne in 1917. First known as La Verne College, accreditation was received by the California Board of Education in 1927, and administrative control was transferred in 1933 to an independent board of trustees.

Following accreditation by the Western College Association in 1955, the school engaged in a vigorous program of innovation during the 1960s with new major program's of study being introduced, such as, the introduction of off-campus degree programs in 1969, addition of a law school in 1970, and the American Armenian International College in 1976, plus a name change in 1977 to the University of La Verne. Presently the University consists of: College of Arts & Sciences, College of Business & Public Management, College of Education and Organizational Leadership, College of Law, and a Regional Campus Administration. It is a co-educational institution hosting about 1,500 main campus undergraduates and about 1,600 graduate students on the main campus of 38 acres. Total enrollment of La Verne is about 7,500 which also includes adult learners, graduate, law, and online students.

Manchester University was incorporated from the former Roanoke Classical Seminary founded in 1860 by members of the United Brethren Church in Roanoke, Indiana. It was moved to North Manchester, Indiana, in 1889, and acquired by the Church of the Brethren in 1902. It was first incorporated as the College and Bible School in 1895.

Presently it is governed by a board of trustees, some of whose members are elected by various Church of the Brethren districts. Accreditation was received by the State of Indiana in 1932. Manchester was the first Brethren affiliated college to offer a Peace Studies program in 1948. It is a co-educational institution with an enrollment near 1,100.

McPherson College was founded in August of 1887, and opened for classes the following year on September 5, 1888. It was the first of the Brethren affiliated colleges to include a biblical studies program as apart of its origination, and the first to request a direct relationship with the Church of the Brethren. McPherson has a strong agricultural department that was strengthened by the acquisition of a one hundred fifty acre farm in 1909.

Accreditation was then received in 1921 from the North Central Association of Colleges. Presently, a board of trustees includes some Brethren from the surrounding church districts. Since it is the only Brethren affiliated institution in the mid-west, McPherson serves a wider geographic region than the other five colleges, with a prospective area of coverage from the Pacific coast to the Mississippi River, and from Canada to Mexico. It is a co-educational institution with an enrollment near 500.

Bethany is the denominational school for ministerial candidates and was founded by the coordinated efforts of Albert Cassel Wieand and Emmanuel Hoff. These two men grew up in the same congregation, but at different times. Hoff was born in 1860 in northern Ohio, but his family moved from the Beech Grove (Chippewa) Church of the Brethren to Iowa. Hoff later graduated from Mount Morris College in Illinois. Wieand was born in 1871 and his German Reformed parents also joined the Brethren at Chippewa because of a deep impression for the Brethren love feast.

Wieand studied at Juniata College and then taught at McPherson. During a leisurely campus stroll, the two men happened to met, and developed a friendship that would later blossom in the founding of a Brethren school to train ministers.