The only Catholic University in Western Kentucky, Brescia has a proud religious and liberal arts heritage. Nearly sixty years ago a group of intrepid Ursuline Sisters responded to the needs of World War II veterans by moving their rural junior college to downtown Owensboro to create a new coeducational institution that would carry on the mission and vision of their founder, St. Angela Merici, who believed that education creates strong families which in turn create a stronger and more just society.