Stay Connected
The Gift of Diversity
With the ultimate goal being the establishment of sustained "pipelines" between Holy Cross and these high schools - including not only students but also their counselors, who ideally become advocates of the College - Kevin Fudge, the assistant director for Community Outreach, and Anabelle Paniagua-Villalobos, the assistant director for National ALANA Recruitment, two of the new additions to the program, take as their primary focus "becoming a presence."
For Fudge, whose particular territory is the diocesan schools in Boston, this means constantly visiting the schools, spreading enthusiasm and the story of Holy Cross among the students and performing various services. In tandem with school counselors, he holds workshops for parents about the application process and the fine points of filling out financial aid forms, a consistent source of frustration and confusion, where the potential for lost students is high.
Paniagua-Villalobos travels nationwide, visiting cities with diverse populations, also developing a Holy Cross presence in the schools, but targeting community-based agencies as well - groups like A Better Chance or Upward Bound - that identify high school students with potential early on and provide support and encouragement, so that college becomes a real option. Developing a database of such agencies is a particular focus of Panaigua-Villalobos', thus allowing Holy Cross to continue to track students and cultivate these relationships.
Supporting both these positions is Lee Rosario who works at the center of the initiative, coordinating efforts such as the databases and serving as point person for families who visit on the Recruitment Weekend.
In addition to the outreach positions, Cassin's gift allowed the Office of Admissions to hire several ALANA students and an intern who perform a variety of tasks, manning the phones, following up with students missing credentials on applications, and arranging hosts for prospective students who want to visit Holy Cross.
Inviting large numbers of students and their parents to spend several days at Holy Cross, seeing the campus, sitting in on classes, as well as touring Worcester, is yet another dimension of the Recruitment Initiative, one allowed by Cassin's gift. Charles Weiss, director of grants and corporate and foundation giving, speaks of the value of a far-sighted, far-reaching approach to recruiting minority students.
"My sense is that if you have a good story to tell, and you know how to tell a story, people will listen. We have a very good story to tell at Holy Cross. We want to bring students' counselors and teachers here as well, so they too can get a sense and have the continuity, working with (prospective) students over and over again. This is a place of remarkably strong academics, and we here know this, but students in California may not have heard of Holy Cross. We want to tell them that students who come here join a family for life, that this is a very supportive environment that can help them - not only in terms of having an extended family all over the country, but it can be helpful in careers."
The overall effect of this collaboration is a rejuvenated dedication to recruitment, and significant, encouraging results. "We can carry out the things we've always wanted to do but were purely limited by manpower," McDermott says. "The Cassins' gift is incredibly valuable and has already made an enormous impact. We have 30 ALANA students in the early decision pool already. Compare that to the last three years, where there were 31 total."
"There is a critical mass that needs to be attained at the College before it has a sense of validity to it," confirms Weiss. "And the Cassins' grant is really going to make the most obvious change in numbers."
Joe Reilly '55, a longtime friend of Cassin's, who heads the Bishop Healy Committee, a program designed to cultivate alumni in the effort to foster interracial relations at Holy Cross, cites the increase in minority students from 8 percent to 12 percent in the past four years as a sign that the commitment to minority recruitment at Holy Cross is in place. Reilly urges that the new goal become 25 percent (630-650 minority students, where now it's 323), which would be more reflective of the minority presence in the overall population. He confirms how valuable alumni pledges are to this end.
"When alumni who can see clearly, think logically and are generous get involved with an effort such as this, it can make the difference between success and failure," says Reilly.
Dovetailing nicely with this influx of minority students are both a pledge on the part of the administration to match Cassin's grant-spending a million dollars over four years in increased financial aid_and the Murphys' scholarship, which is a great incentive to a student who wants to go to college, has the potential to do well, has heard the story of Holy Cross, but who may be daunted or discouraged by tuition costs. While Weiss hopes that other generous alumni will make donations in the form of scholarships, McDermott makes the point that being able both to admit and fund students is crucial to the overall recruitment effort. She credits alumni gifts with allowing the College to continue to do that.
"That's actually what this campaign going forward is all about," says McDermott - "to enable us to continue to meet need, so that we're a realistic choice for any and all students."
How does a Jesuit college position itself in the 21st century? Simply becoming a "realistic choice" may be one answer. Combining generosity, faith and a commitment to provide a quality education in all aspects of life for any student willing to work hard and better him or herself may be the goal for which to strive. The effort, it seems, reaps both actual results and the inspiration to keep trying.
As Charles Weiss says, "Knowing the commitment of the College, we're going to have a new day here."