Located at St. Anthony's Orphanage, the college was operated by the Poor Sisters of St. Francis Seraph and offered continuing education classes for nuns during the summer.
[3] The college moved to a new location at the former Rio Grande Industrial School campus on South 2nd Street in 1946, and control was handed back to the Poor Sisters the following year.
[10] Under Frank Kleinhenz, its first lay president, the university reorganized its operations in the 1970s by relaxing admissions requirements and putting more emphasis on two-year and certificate programs in order to boost enrollment.
Faced with mounting debts and the prospect of increased competition after the Technical Vocational Institute was authorized to offer two-year degrees, the university announced its closing at the end of the 1986 spring semester.
[12] Following the university's closing, the campus was repurposed to house St. Pius X High School as well as offices of the Archdiocese of Santa Fe.
The two-story brick buildings housed classrooms, offices, laboratories, a library, and a chapel,[14] and now form the nucleus of the St. Pius X High School campus.
The University of Albuquerque's sports teams, nicknamed the Dons, competed as NAIA independents in basketball, baseball, golf, tennis, and soccer.
One of the Dons' most notable recruits was 6-foot-8-inch (2.03 m) center Zoilo Dominguez, a veteran of the Argentinean national team who was named a third-team All-American in 1966.