The Congregational Training School for Women was founded at Chicago Theological Seminary in 1909 as an opportunity to provide Congregational women with advanced educational training for professional positions within the Congregational Church at the beginning of the twentieth century. The school continued its mission until it was subsumed into Chicago Theological Seminary in 1926. This collection includes course schedules, correspondence, meeting minutes, reports, pamphlets, and alumnae association records.

Students were at least twenty-five years old, and generally from a middle-class, Midwestern background. A stipulation of entrance to the school was that students also possess a strong moral and religious character. Courses were taught under the rubric of religious, social work, and practical coursework. Practical courses included music, public speaking, arts and crafts, physical education, business skills, domestic arts, and foreign languages. Students were trained as professional church workers. The first graduating class included five women – one became a minister of a home missions parish in North Dakota, two became church assistants, one worked at a settlement house, and one took a position with the Congregational Educational Society in Chicago.

Florence Fensham was the first dean, succeeded by Agnes M. Taylor and Margaret M. Taylor, when Dean Fensham passed away unexpectedly in 1912. The Chicago Theological Seminary decided to allow full acceptance of women to its programs in 1926, thereby eliminating the need for a separate institution for women. The Congregational Training School for women was dissolved at that time.