Santa Clara University

Our Plan

A Lilly Endowment Grant

Santa Clara University, a comprehensive Jesuit, Catholic university located in California's Silicon Valley, offers its 8,060 students rigorous undergraduate curricula in arts and sciences, business, and engineering, plus master's and law degrees. Distinguished nationally by the third-highest graduation rate among all U.S. master's universities, California's oldest higher-education institution demonstrates faith-inspired values of ethics and social justice.

Santa Clara University has been awarded a grant by Lilly Endowment Inc. of Indiana to create and enhance the Jesuit University's programs for students, faculty, and staff to integrate faith commitments, professional choices, and a call to leadership in society. The grant has funded a new program called DISCOVER, "Developing and Inspiring Scholarly Communities Oriented toward Vocational Engagement and Reflection," which capitalizes on two recent developments at SCU. The first is a shift from traditional residence halls to Residential Learning Communities, where students combine living and learning. The second is the new standard for Jesuit education, which calls for faith-inspired students to be in solidarity with those most in need. DISCOVER builds on these developments in three ways. Over the years of its life it has provided funds for:

Residential Learning Communities (RLC)

In September 2003, we integrated two existing two-year Residential Learning Communities (RLC) into one four-year RLC, Loyola. Loyola was previously a freshmen-sophomore community with a successful program of linked courses and co-curricular activities such as weekly dinners and liturgies. Sobrato was previously a junior-senior community especially designed for students with an interest in faith and justice, service and leadership. The grant helped integrate these two RLCs into a single community, and funds five areas that encourage vocational discernment: course development, companionship, prayer, reflection, and engagement.

In addition, the grant provides opportunities for students in all RLCs to examine their career choices in conjunction with courses, workshops, and retreats, and in contact with SCU alumni. Towards this end, the grant has funded new positions in the Loyola RLC, Campus Ministry and the Career Center.

Faculty and Staff Vocational Development

The grant provides mentors who can accompany students as they discover where their talents meet the world's needs. During the planning grant process, we explored the crucial moments and different issues in the formation of faculty from the pre-tenure process through the post-tenure process. We also explored how faculty and staff must ultimately work together to better model an integrated approach to education for our students. Santa Clara, like many other universities, has a number of highly successful programs for faculty that have vocational components. To build a critical mass of faculty and staff to promote vocational reflection in our students, we need to channel those who have completed our various programs into the University-wide RLC structure and other programs in DISCOVER. The grant fundsed for four years a vocation seminar for faculty and staff, partially supports the Bannan Institute's successful Ignatian Faculty Forum, a mini-grants program for those interested in developing their own work in the classroom and beyond, and a coordinated effort to sustain faculty and staff interaction around vocation.

Faith and Justice Immersions and Ministry Internships

The grant funds the expansion of the Faith and Justice Student Immersion trips. This has created opportunities for more than 1,000 students to work with poor communities in California, Latin America, and abroad. In addition, the grant will create 15 summer ministry internships, enabling students to explore the rewards and demands of leadership in professional ministry. The Program Director for Faith and Justice Education and three graduate students will form a team to coordinate all activities relating to these two programs.

Outcomes of the Project

In cooperation with various departments and offices on campus, DISCOVER will provide a wide menu of options year after year that will help students make critical choices about their lives in the present and future. At the same time, in conjunction with the Bannan Center for Jesuit Education and the Arrupe Center for Community-based Learning, DISCOVER will provide necessary resources for faculty and staff to mentor students as they discern their vocation.