Division I athletics as a member of the Mountain West Conference.
Although the U.S. Department of Education categorizes GCU as a for-profit university, the IRS classifies it as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation, the regional accreditation body, the Higher Learning Commission, classifies it as nonprofit, and it has nonprofit approvals from the State of Arizona and the Arizona Board for Private Postsecondary Education. As of November 2024, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that the Education Department exceeded the authority granted to it under the Higher Education Act and ordered the Department to re-evaluate its classification using a different standard.
== History ==
=== Founding ===
Grand Canyon College was founded as a nonprofit institution in 1949 in Prescott, Arizona, by the Arizona Southern Baptist Convention. The institution was founded so local Baptists could obtain college degrees without going east to a Baptist college in Texas or Oklahoma.
On October 8, 1951, Grand Canyon College relocated …
