Ohio Dominian Returns to Its Roots

University trying to re-create campus atmosphere

August 21, 2004

Kathy Lynn Gray
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

"Where will we house the students next year?" wondered one college administrator.

"The parking lots can't hold the cars," complained another.

"We're running out of classroom space," fretted a third.

But Ohio Dominican University's growth prompted an entirely different response from President Jack Calareso at a meeting this summer:

"The first thing we do is stand up and applaud."

Adding more residential students has been Calareso's charge since he became the first layperson -- and man -- to run the small, Catholic college on the East Side.

Expansion isn't unusual at universities, but Ohio Dominican is attempting quite a makeover -- transforming from a mostly commuter, adult student base to one where at least half are traditional students.

As students begin to return to campus Sunday, the pace of change quickens, as the number of residence halls doubles to four, two new graduate and two new undergraduate programs are added and the school's first football team begins intercollegiate play in a new stadium. The school expects 650 students to live on campus.

When Calareso came to Ohio Dominican in 2001, only 267 of the school's 2,197 students lived on the 62-acre campus.

Most students were nontraditional ones seeking additional degrees, weekend classes or the chance to complete a halted college education.

But that wasn't the case when Columbus resident Nancy Recchie studied home economics there in the early 1970s.

Her classmates were mostly fresh out of high school and lived on campus. But during her time as an Ohio Dominican trustee the past 10 years, she realized that the campus had changed dramatically.

"We'd had a huge increase in nontraditional students, and it concerned the board that the balance was tipping. We felt the traditional-age students should be setting the tone for the campus."

Many on-campus activities had died out as the residential population had dwindled, and that made it harder to recruit undergraduates.

When Sister Mary Andrew Matesich retired as Ohio Dominican president in 2001 after 23 years, the board decided to hire Calareso to move the school's focus to a more traditional campus.

"The board of trustees charged me to build a three-legged stool, with one leg traditional programs, one nontraditional and the third graduate programs," Calareso said.

That's beginning to happen.

This fall, 460 freshmen are expected, more than double the 200 in 2001. Total enrollment is expected to reach 3,025, 459 more than in 2003, with much of the growth among freshmen and transfer students outside the school's adult programs.

"Having more students live on campus is starting to put it back to where a lot of us remember, where there's dances, concerts and plays," Recchie said. "You have to have students living there 24 hours a day to make that happen."

That's where football comes in. "It's part of what people perceive a small, liberal-arts school should have," Calareso said. "It's one more thing to attract students."

Within five years Calareso hopes to have 4,000 to 5,000 students, including 2,500 traditional ones. He's aiming for an on-campus population of 1,225. The shift to more traditional students is a return to the school's roots.

The school was started in 1911 by the Dominican Sisters of St. Mary of the Springs as a Catholic women's college named College of St. Mary of the Springs. The school remained a small undergraduate residential institution until the late 1970s, when it added more adult programs. Male students were admitted and the school's name had been changed to Ohio Dominican College in the 1960s.

Sister Catherine Colby, who's taught at Ohio Dominican for 16 years, said living on campus fits in better with the Dominican's holistic approach to education.

"There's a certain life that's generated on the university campus," she said. "The changes are really rooted in our mission."

Tuition increases are funding some of the changes; a full-time traditional student now pays $18,000 a year compared with $12,700 in 2001. Financial aid for students also has increased, with 90 percent of students receiving aid compared with 65 percent to 70 percent in 2001. In another change, the school changed its name in July 2002, taking on university to reflect its growing graduate programs.

Next up: The school's first student union, expected to break ground in 2005. The Diocese of Columbus donated $1 million for the project. It's expected to cost $15 million to $20 million and include dining halls, a bookstore, a student lounge and student organization offices.

Also planned are more dormitories and athletic facilities.

"Keep your eye on us; we're moving along," Colby said.

Reprinted with permission. The Columbus Dispatch, 2004.