Catholic University Ranked As #64 Best Value School by US News

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do those rankings actually mean anything? Even the normal US News rankings are of dubious worth.

Exactly my thoughts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parents - please do your research on Catholic University prior to committing. Much of the student programming, advising offices, cultural engagement offices have been cut as of yesterday. Multiple Departments have 2-3 faculty members. They have lost a lot of the competent faculty members who do not agree with the direction. In addition, they just fired multiple staff members yesterday leaving most of the offices skeletal. The university is welcoming to right wing, white Catholics and supporters of Trump but terrible for those who may not agree.

Note sent by the president yesterday
By Peter Kilpatrick ● May 19, 2025

Dear Members of the University Community,

Last October, I wrote to you about the growing deficits our University has faced due to declining enrollment revenue and rising costs, and the steps we needed to take to align our operational expenses with our revenue. At that time, I shared that we needed to make difficult, deep cuts in our operating budget and identify areas for revenue growth to ensure the long-term financial strength of the University.

Our approach to adjusting our annual operating budget by $30 million—approximately 10%—has included multiple strategic components:

Reduce operational budgets across administrative and academic units, which included reducing our planned salary increase pool from 4% to 2.5% and reducing our maximum retirement contribution from 10% to 7.5%;

Launch several revenue-enhancing initiatives, including a new bachelor and master of science in artificial intelligence, an accelerated bachelor of science in nursing, a master in business administration, a new online master in data analytics, and a master of evangelization and culture, in partnership with Bishop Barron’s Word on Fire Institute;

Offer voluntary separation packages to qualified faculty; and

Select a number of position eliminations based on business and operational needs of the University to minimize the negative impact on University service levels to students.

Conclusion

Today, with a heavy heart, I must inform you that we have implemented the concluding phase of our comprehensive financial resiliency plan, which unfortunately involves the elimination of 66 active staff positions across various departments, accounting for 7% of our workforce.

Those directly affected were notified today, and I want to acknowledge the tremendous contributions these valued colleagues have made to our University community. Each person affected has helped shape our institution and contributed to our mission in meaningful ways. They will remain on paid leave for one month, during which time they will not be responsible for any work and will continue to receive full benefits.

Omg. Very clear and shocking.

[Anonymous]

This is happening everywhere for variety of reasons. Blaming Catholic’s issues on religion is lazy and bigoted.

Georgetown just announced a hiring freeze.
“GU Budget Reductions Include Hiring Freeze, Spending Cuts
By Ari Citrin and Ajani Stella • April 29, 2025
Georgetown University will take steps to limit expenses and increase revenue, including a temporary hiring freeze for faculty and staff and pause on merit salary increases, as the federal government makes significant cuts to higher education.”
https://thehoya.com/news/developing-gu-budget-reductions-include-hiring-freeze-spending-cuts/

American University navigates budget shortfall for 2026 budget
https://www.theeagleonline.com/article/2024/12/american-university-navigates-budget-shortfall-for-2026-budget

GW: “At the same time, we also want to be transparent with you about GW’s specific financial issues. In recent years, our university’s expenses have grown at a faster rate than revenues, creating a significant and unsustainable gap that compounds each year. Continuing this trend, while we expect modest revenue growth, it will not meet our projected expenses across many areas and the need to provide more financial aid to students. This trajectory threatens to undermine the university's long-term financial stability.”
https://provost.gwu.edu/actions-address-budget-challenges


Financial Reckoning Hits Universities: Pay Cuts, Layoffs and No Coffee https://www.wsj.com/us-news/education/university-spending-cuts-layoffs-pay-budget-trump-9f261d14

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parents - please do your research on Catholic University prior to committing. Much of the student programming, advising offices, cultural engagement offices have been cut as of yesterday. Multiple Departments have 2-3 faculty members. They have lost a lot of the competent faculty members who do not agree with the direction. In addition, they just fired multiple staff members yesterday leaving most of the offices skeletal. The university is welcoming to right wing, white Catholics and supporters of Trump but terrible for those who may not agree.

Note sent by the president yesterday
By Peter Kilpatrick ● May 19, 2025

Dear Members of the University Community,

Last October, I wrote to you about the growing deficits our University has faced due to declining enrollment revenue and rising costs, and the steps we needed to take to align our operational expenses with our revenue. At that time, I shared that we needed to make difficult, deep cuts in our operating budget and identify areas for revenue growth to ensure the long-term financial strength of the University.

Our approach to adjusting our annual operating budget by $30 million—approximately 10%—has included multiple strategic components:

Reduce operational budgets across administrative and academic units, which included reducing our planned salary increase pool from 4% to 2.5% and reducing our maximum retirement contribution from 10% to 7.5%;

Launch several revenue-enhancing initiatives, including a new bachelor and master of science in artificial intelligence, an accelerated bachelor of science in nursing, a master in business administration, a new online master in data analytics, and a master of evangelization and culture, in partnership with Bishop Barron’s Word on Fire Institute;

Offer voluntary separation packages to qualified faculty; and

Select a number of position eliminations based on business and operational needs of the University to minimize the negative impact on University service levels to students.

Conclusion

Today, with a heavy heart, I must inform you that we have implemented the concluding phase of our comprehensive financial resiliency plan, which unfortunately involves the elimination of 66 active staff positions across various departments, accounting for 7% of our workforce.

Those directly affected were notified today, and I want to acknowledge the tremendous contributions these valued colleagues have made to our University community. Each person affected has helped shape our institution and contributed to our mission in meaningful ways. They will remain on paid leave for one month, during which time they will not be responsible for any work and will continue to receive full benefits.

As a now former staff member who was one of those 66, I can tell you that student services were gutted yesterday. My over 18 years of service to the university and it's students were disrespected and It is hard for me to understand how they continue to operate with a skeleton amount of staff and services. This president made a mistake in doubling down on the extreme parts of Catholic identity rather than looking to be more welcoming of Catholicism in many forms and now the staff/faculty/students will pay

It must be painful. The university made a decision that certain employees were not a value-add to its success. Colleges have to be very mindful of their financial house these days and I'm afraid that CUA will not be the last that has to do this.

[Anonymous]

Catholic UA charges 60K tuition per year and has an 86% acceptance rate. How US News calculates "value," I really don't know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is happening everywhere for variety of reasons. Blaming Catholic’s issues on religion is lazy and bigoted.

Georgetown just announced a hiring freeze.
“GU Budget Reductions Include Hiring Freeze, Spending Cuts
By Ari Citrin and Ajani Stella • April 29, 2025
Georgetown University will take steps to limit expenses and increase revenue, including a temporary hiring freeze for faculty and staff and pause on merit salary increases, as the federal government makes significant cuts to higher education.”
https://thehoya.com/news/developing-gu-budget-reductions-include-hiring-freeze-spending-cuts/

American University navigates budget shortfall for 2026 budget
https://www.theeagleonline.com/article/2024/12/american-university-navigates-budget-shortfall-for-2026-budget

GW: “At the same time, we also want to be transparent with you about GW’s specific financial issues. In recent years, our university’s expenses have grown at a faster rate than revenues, creating a significant and unsustainable gap that compounds each year. Continuing this trend, while we expect modest revenue growth, it will not meet our projected expenses across many areas and the need to provide more financial aid to students. This trajectory threatens to undermine the university's long-term financial stability.”
https://provost.gwu.edu/actions-address-budget-challenges


Financial Reckoning Hits Universities: Pay Cuts, Layoffs and No Coffee https://www.wsj.com/us-news/education/university-spending-cuts-layoffs-pay-budget-trump-9f261d14

This sounds like the opposite of blaming Catholic University's issues on the Universal Global Catholic Church which is inclusive, loving and communal. This is about being forthright about what you get if you choose to go to a university like Catholic. The one poster was correct - please don't attend this school if you are not mission consistent or if you are looking for a strong school culture. It sounds like all of that is non existent at the Marshmallow on the Hill.

[Anonymous]

FWIW, we know a lot of students who are there (3 kids form local Catholic HSs). All the students we here from have a positive experience at the college. My DC all really want to get outside the Catholic bubble.

[Anonymous]

PP- here and I meant to type the DC bubble! Two out of three going to Catholic colleges!

[Anonymous]

We are Catholic and college-searching now for our ‘26 daughter. But I would not feel safe sending her to live in that location.

[Anonymous]

CUA alum here, and a Catholic.

I'm sad that CUA has gone downhill in some ways. It used to be that there were both conservative Catholics and liberal, social justice Catholics at CUA. Indeed, most of my best friends at Catholic were both very Catholic and liberal leaning. Catholic became pretty hostile to the social justice Catholics, and really radically embraced the conservative side (e.g., not allowing LGBTQ groups).

I get that there are lots of conservative Catholics and I don't begrudge that they're at CUA. But I'm sad that liberal Catholics can't see themselves there anymore. I just think that a reality happens when you cut off maybe half of the folks who might apply (liberal Catholics). You drastically decreased the applicant pool, which means admissions standards decrease. And folks start to not recognize the place they used to love.

I have a lot of good to say about CUA, but the administrations in the last 2 decades have really made the school significantly worse.

And I know a lot of faculty who are unhappy about it.

[Anonymous]

FWIW, in addition to the recent US News Best Value rating, Forbes gave Catholic a B grade on its 2024 Financial Grading of Colleges (the same grade that Georgetown, NYU, and BU received). Its hard to believe that Catholic's finances are that bad mere months after Forbes ranked it. Layoffs are always regrettable, but at least Catholic is taking steps to right its ship.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are Catholic and college-searching now for our ‘26 daughter. But I would not feel safe sending her to live in that location.

Do you mean gentrified brookland? I wouldn’t feel safe either!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parents - please do your research on Catholic University prior to committing. Much of the student programming, advising offices, cultural engagement offices have been cut as of yesterday. Multiple Departments have 2-3 faculty members. They have lost a lot of the competent faculty members who do not agree with the direction. In addition, they just fired multiple staff members yesterday leaving most of the offices skeletal. The university is welcoming to right wing, white Catholics and supporters of Trump but terrible for those who may not agree.

Note sent by the president yesterday
By Peter Kilpatrick ● May 19, 2025

Dear Members of the University Community,

Last October, I wrote to you about the growing deficits our University has faced due to declining enrollment revenue and rising costs, and the steps we needed to take to align our operational expenses with our revenue. At that time, I shared that we needed to make difficult, deep cuts in our operating budget and identify areas for revenue growth to ensure the long-term financial strength of the University.

Our approach to adjusting our annual operating budget by $30 million—approximately 10%—has included multiple strategic components:

Reduce operational budgets across administrative and academic units, which included reducing our planned salary increase pool from 4% to 2.5% and reducing our maximum retirement contribution from 10% to 7.5%;

Launch several revenue-enhancing initiatives, including a new bachelor and master of science in artificial intelligence, an accelerated bachelor of science in nursing, a master in business administration, a new online master in data analytics, and a master of evangelization and culture, in partnership with Bishop Barron’s Word on Fire Institute;

Offer voluntary separation packages to qualified faculty; and

Select a number of position eliminations based on business and operational needs of the University to minimize the negative impact on University service levels to students.

Conclusion

Today, with a heavy heart, I must inform you that we have implemented the concluding phase of our comprehensive financial resiliency plan, which unfortunately involves the elimination of 66 active staff positions across various departments, accounting for 7% of our workforce.

Those directly affected were notified today, and I want to acknowledge the tremendous contributions these valued colleagues have made to our University community. Each person affected has helped shape our institution and contributed to our mission in meaningful ways. They will remain on paid leave for one month, during which time they will not be responsible for any work and will continue to receive full benefits.

As a now former staff member who was one of those 66, I can tell you that student services were gutted yesterday. My over 18 years of service to the university and it's students were disrespected and It is hard for me to understand how they continue to operate with a skeleton amount of staff and services. This president made a mistake in doubling down on the extreme parts of Catholic identity rather than looking to be more welcoming of Catholicism in many forms and now the staff/faculty/students will pay

As a CUA alum, I wish I knew what this meant

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are Catholic and college-searching now for our ‘26 daughter. But I would not feel safe sending her to live in that location.

Do you mean gentrified brookland? I wouldn’t feel safe either!

then you must need a college in fairly land where there is zero chance of any crime

[Anonymous]

Infuriating to me as a Catholic and CUA alum that the Catholic Church couldn't part with a tiny fraction of its gazillion billion dollars and try to jump start CUA. It has some good things going for it. A gazillionaire alum wall streeter recently pumped tens of millions into their business school.