Beloit College is a private liberal arts college in Beloit, Wisconsin. Founded in 1846, when Wisconsin was still a territory, it is the state's oldest continuously operated college. It is a member of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest and has an enrollment of roughly 1,400 undergraduate students. History Beloit College was founded by the group Friends for Education, which was started by seven pioneers from New England who, soon after their arrival in the Wisconsin Territory, agreed that a college needed to be established. The group raised funds for a college in their town and convinced the territorial legislature to enact the charter for Beloit College on February 2, 1846. The first building (then called Middle College) was built in 1847, and remains in operation. Classes began in the fall of 1847, with the first degrees awarded in 1851. Beloit's first president was a Yale University graduate, Aaron Lucius Chapin, who served from 1849 to 1886. The college became coeducational in 1895. In 1904, Grace Ousley became the first African-American woman to graduate from the college. Although independent today, Beloit College was historically, though unofficially, associated with Congregationalism. The college remained very small for almost its entire first century, with enrollment topping 1,000 students only with the influx of World War II veterans in 1945–46. The "Beloit Plan" was a year-round curriculum introduced in 1964 that comprised three full terms and a "field term" of off-campus study. The trustees returned to the two-semester program in 1978. The college experienced an unanticipated $7 million budget shortfall during the 2018–19 academic year. Lower than anticipated freshman enrollment and retention of rising sophomores was blamed. In response the college made several changes, including laying off faculty and staff and reducing salaries. Campus Beloit's campus is within the Near East Side Historic District. The campus has 20 conical, linear, and animal effigy mounds built between about 400 and 1200, created by Native Americans identified by archaeologists as Late Woodland people. One of the mounds, in the shape of a turtle, inspired Beloit's symbol and official mascot. The mounds on Beloit's campus are "catalogued" burial sites, and therefore may not be disturbed without a Wisconsin Historical Society permit. Several of the Beloit College sites have been partially excavated and restored, and material found within them—including pottery and tool fragments—is held in the college's Logan Museum of Anthropology. In 2008 Beloit College completed a Center