Shorter College is a two-year, private, historically black liberal arts college located in North Little Rock, Arkansas. It was founded in 1886 (originally as Bethel University) by the African Methodist Episcopal Church as a logical and pragmatic response to the need of recently freed slaves to overcome the many disadvantages and deprivations of slavery and racial discrimination. This was a time, little more than twenty years after the end of the Civil War and the abolition of slavery, when black people had no access to institutions of higher learning. In fact, the prevailing attitude was that Blacks had no capacity for learning and the vast majority lacked basic education and skills.