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

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]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.
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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. [b] 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 [/b] and now the staff/faculty/students will pay
[/quote]
As a CUA alum, I wish I knew what this meant[/quote]

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