On April 18, after much prayer and discernment, Franciscan University’s Board of Trustees unanimously approved the Step in Faith COVID-19 response plan.
For new full-time undergraduate students, Step in Faith will cover 100 percent of tuition (after scholarships and grants) for the fall 2020 semester.
For all returning students, Step in Faith will provide additional tuition assistance, plus one semester of free graduate school here. It also will offer financial assistance to any returning student experiencing significant financial hardship due to the pandemic.
This is a huge step for a small university. It requires us to place radical trust in God and act with heroic generosity. But this is what I believe God has asked us to do.
I don’t want to see any young person lose the chance to receive the same life-changing formation in faith and reason that you received at Franciscan University.
The above comes from a May 8 emailed letter from Franciscan University’s president, Father Dave Pivonka.
What an act of faith! Pray they get a bonanza of new, very generous benefactors!
This is a great opportunity at a great (and truly Catholic) university!
(Full disclosure: we’re biased: my wife and I, four of our “kids” and two of their spouses are alumni, as is Father Dave.)
Is this trying to put a positive spin on a cataclysmic drop in applications and enrollment commitments? The school is in danger of imploding due to expected enrollment collapse, so to try to get students in the door who might possibly pay tuition in spring and afterwards they are using the equivalent of a Black Friday deal by offering free fall tuition?
You win the cynicism prize. Franciscan is expensive and many of its students are from larger Catholic families. People come from all over the US and other countries to attend there. When other small Catholic colleges have had to close, Franciscan helped their students by guaranteeing them that they could attend Franciscan for the same price as those other colleges. They just really are charitable.
From the Huffington Post: COVID-19 has thrown pre-K, K-12, and higher education into a state of financial disarray. The pandemic has been particularly catastrophic for private Catholic schools: At least 100 across the country are expected not to reopen in the fall, according to the National Catholic Education Association.
Maybe a comparison with a Catholic college here in California would be helpful. This year, tuition at Franciscan is $28,880, while at Santa Clara University, tuition is $53,634. Franciscan has an endowment of only $54.5 million dollars while Santa Clara University has an endowment of more than one billion dollars. I believe that Fr. Dave, the board and the Franciscan friars are sincerely trying to provide a life-long Catholic influence on as many young men and women as possible. I think God has used that small university in disproportionate ways. The number of Franciscan alumni serving the Church and world in so many ways, including vocations to the priesthood, religious life, holy matrimony and the diaconate, is impressive. Thanks be to God.