Our History
The 91¶ÌÊÓƵ Washington Semester program was founded in 1976 as the Washington Study-Service Year (WSSY), incorporating community living, service learning, academic study, and critical reflection about vocation, servant leadership, and the city. The name was changed to the Washington Community Scholars’ Center in 2002, at which time the program converted to three terms per year (fall, spring, summer), but retained the same core elements.
For over forty years, WSSY/91¶ÌÊÓƵ Washington Semester has emphasized a commitment to group life, intercultural understanding, and peacebuilding in diverse and often underserved communities in the nation's capital. These program emphases reflect 91¶ÌÊÓƵ's commitments to intercultural and community learning, to producing students with a global village worldview, and to Biblically-based concepts of peacemaking and social justice.
