Serving Students Together: CHARISM Alliance Will Create Greater Academic Opportunities, Connections

Dominican University is carving out new and transformative pathways to educational opportunities, student experiences and faculty and staff collaboration through a unique alliance formed last fall with three other Catholic, Hispanic-Serving Institutions.

The alliance is known as CHARISM (Catholic Higher Education Alliance of Rising Institutions in Service and Mission). The partnership, launched in December, brings Dominican together with University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas; University of Mount Saint Vincent in New York City; and Universidad del Sagrado Corazón in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Through shared resources, joint programs and expanded professional development among faculty and staff, all four institutions are working together to advance academic opportunities that are innovative, culturally responsive, mission-centered and future focused.

Though located in very different parts of the country, the four institutions share commonalities at their core: each was founded by Catholic Sisters and is rooted in Catholic social teaching; each is over a century old; and each serves a sizable population of Hispanic and first-generation students. Most of all, all four share a mission of identifying new paths forward to build strong academic foundations that will ensure student success in the workforce and beyond.

“In forming CHARISM, we believe fundamentally that, like other systems or networks, the whole can be more than our individual parts,” said Dominican University President Dr. Glena G. Temple during the December launch. “As Catholic institutions with similar origin stories, values and priorities, we believe we can better serve our students and communities by collaborating, innovating and growing together.”

In January, senior leaders from the four universities met at Universidad del Sagrado Corazón to begin moving the CHARISM initiative closer to implementation. Some planned opportunities include:

• a new model for occupational therapy education with a potential satellite campus at Dominican led by UIW San Antonio faculty.
• a new pathway for pre-physician assistant students allowing them to participate in an online program, develop a robust portfolio and enroll in a summer immersion experience using PA educational facilities at Dominican or Mount Saint Vincent.
• a mission-centered, bilingual, study away immersion experience for nursing students to learn and practice clinical skills in Puerto Rico, Guatemala, or the U.S.-Mexico border region.
• additional connections for business courses.

Dr. Thomas M. Evans, president of UIW, credited Dominican University President Emerita Dr. Donna M. Carroll with “playing a significant role” in bringing the four institutions together, and noted that she, among others, had long suggested a UIW-Dominican working partnership. During a meeting in Chicago, he and Temple connected to begin conversations, which was followed by talks with the additional institutions, he noted.

In a letter read by Evans during the CHARISM launch on Dec. 8, Carroll, now president of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, called CHARISM a “model for other affinity groups networks.” She added that the recognized, innovative practices established by each university will, when combined, “promise impact at a scale that no one institution could establish by itself.”

Evans agreed.

“While each of our institutions has numerous opportunities for our students, in working together we are finding dynamic intersections where our academic work can meet,” he said.

Dr. Eva Fernández, provost and vice president for academic affairs at UIW, said CHARISM allows the universities to “reimagine how Catholic institutions work.”

“We are taking a bold step in forging an alliance that will allow us to chart new courses for academic exploration, for discovery and growth,” she said.