First Catholic college in South Carolina to open in fall 2024

Rosary College logo. / Credit: Rosary College

CNA Staff, May 10, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

Author and Anglican convert Father Dwight Longenecker along with a number of Catholic scholars are launching the first Catholic college in South Carolina, a two-year liberal arts college set to open this fall.

Rosary College will offer an associate of Catholic studies in integrated humanities degree, which can be transferred to a number of other universities. The college offers “an affordable, transferable credit for students who are either going on to a four-year Catholic college or those who are going into the workforce and/or trade school,” Longenecker explained in a post on X. 

“Our focus is with our foundation on truth, beauty, and goodness, and in alignment with our primary value of Catholic identity,” Mike Shick, founding president of Rosary College, told CNA in a phone call. “We want to ensure that we’re in alignment with the magisterium of the holy, Catholic, and apostolic Church.”

While 20% of Americans are Catholic nationwide, only 10% of South Carolinians are Catholic, according to Pew Research. South Carolina is predominantly Protestant (about 66%), while 19% of South Carolinians are unaffiliated “religious nones.” 

Greenville, South Carolina, however,  has a “robust community” of Catholics, drawing people from all over the U.S., said Shick, who moved his family of 10 from Virginia to the city of 70,000 last year.

“While the percentage in the number of Catholics that are here [is low], many of the folks that are here now have come from various different areas around the United States, all because it’s, anecdotally, a fervent Catholic area,” Shick said.  

Rosary College will take inspiration from the Benedictine tradition of prayer and work, Shick said, as they build the college “brick by brick.” 

“We feel that calling to be able to support our students, be able to help them develop, through not only contemplation but … that they’re being able to evangelize through who they are, through their work,” Shick said. “Not through apologetics, but through being principled, having integrity, and [being] ordered toward truth, beauty, and goodness.”

The curriculum will include classes on Euclidean geometry, the foundations of science, and business while also offering various literature courses, Latin, philosophy, and Catholic theology. 

“It helps our kids navigate those first two v[ery] tricky years of college successfully,” Longenecker explained in the post. “It consolidates the Catholic worldview necessary to keep the faith and succeed in life.”

To help students easily transfer their credits, Rosary College partnered with two Newman-guide recognized Catholic colleges: Ave Maria University in Ave Maria, Florida, and Thomas More College of Liberal Arts in Merrimack, New Hampshire.

Renowned Catholic scholars Joseph Pearce, prolific author and host of an EWTN series about Shakespeare, and Jared Staudt, former dean of the St. Augustine Institute, are members of the board of trustees for Rosary College. 

Tuition will be $450 per credit hour, with an estimated full-time student tuition of $7,150 per semester. For a non-student auditing a course, the cost will be $675 per course. For its first years, Rosary College will operate out of rented classrooms.  

“We are much closer in alignment with the cost for tuition at local community college, secular community college,” Shick noted. “It’s not a one for one, but we’re a lot closer to that. And so from a price-point perspective, we are certainly well positioned for those families with a larger number of children and things of that nature. I got to tell you, as a father of eight, I certainly can appreciate that.”

But while their tuition cost is similar to community college tuition, Shick pointed out that “nearly all” of the faculty hold doctorate degrees. 

“I’m just thrilled to be a part of… I wouldn’t call it a renewal, but setting a foundation to ensure that we are in alignment with the magisterium, that we can provide that authentic education that people are so much looking for, that’s rigorous and affordable,” Shick added. “I’m thrilled to be a part of it, and I’m really looking forward to the offerings and the things to come.”

More information can be found on Rosary College’s website.