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The Detroit Institute of Technology was a fully accredited, four-year technical college in Detroit, Michigan that closed operations in 1981.
First called the Association Institute, the private school was founded in 1891, and later developed into a private engineering and science college in conjunction with the Detroit YMCA, formalizing its evening adult education program; the later name was adopted in 1918.
A pharmacy program, originally organized under the Detroit College of Medicine, became part of the school in 1907. In 1957, the pharmacy program merged with the School of Pharmacy at Wayne State University. In 1971, the S. S. Kresge Corporation, which was moving to Troy, Michigan, donated its downtown Detroit headquarters to the school.
Accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools (NCA), also known as North Central, is one of six regional accreditation organizations recognized by the United States Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation. Founded in 1895, the NCA accredits over 10,000 public and private educational institutions serving 19 Midwestern, South-Central and a few Western states, including: Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.
For a time, affiliated with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with which the DIT trustees commissioned a study ... to discover just what their role was approaching the 1980s. Lurking on the horizon was the [1979] Iranian hostage crisis. One-third of students then at DIT were Iranians. Many left without paying.
The college played in the NAIA College Division. The college also previously fielded a football team until 1951. It consisted of 3 colleges, 1 each of liberal arts and sciences, business administration, and engineering. The transcripts for DIT students are available from Lawrence Technological University in Southfield, MI, which also offers alumni programs.
A former teacher at DIT in the 1890s was Henry Ford, inventor, innovator and founder of Ford Motor Company. Notable in Michigan politics, alumnus Richard H. Austin, former Michigan Secretary of State.