New Faculty Hiring Policy Undermines Catholic Identity

According to Father Robert Sullivan, the chair of the Provost’s ad hoc committee on hiring, the goal is “to exceed annually 50% in the hiring of  [Catholics to the] instructional faculty,” When Father Sullivan’s statement appeared in The Irish Rover, we wrote Father Jenkins asking whether this is indeed the new policy. When he did not respond, we wrote again to say that we must conclude with regret that it is.  This goal will fall far short of maintaining a Catholic majority because of the faculty demographics that have resulted from decades of hiring with an eye principally to secular reputation instead of to maintaining Catholic faculty predominance.