Conservatives? In San Francisco??

Here's another new addition to the local BPPVE list: The CA-approved Campion College of San Francisco.

This thing has an interesting genesis. It originally was the St.Ignatius Institute at the University of San Francisco, SF's Jesuit university. The Institute was a traditionalist great-books program in the middle of a quite liberal university. Then USF inaugurated a new university president, who quickly announced the firing of the Institute's leadership and the overhaul of the Institute. That led to faculty resignations and to that rarity of rarities, a conservative student demonstration (in San Francisco!) including protest chants in Latin!

So the staff and students of the Ignatious Institute, faced with the gutting of their program, severed their links with USF, went down the street and set up shop as the new Campion College. The school had some bigtime backing right out of the gate, including Ignatius Press, a major Catholic publisher, Christof Cardinal Schonborn, the author of the Catholic catechism, and some conservative heavyweights like Bill Bennett and Michael Novak.

The Jesuit order struck back, ordering the founder of Ignatius Press out of his position in San Francisco, forbidding him on pain of removal from the order from having any contact with Campion, and assigning him to a position as assistant hospital chaplain at a hospital in Duarte California (LA county) that had already served as a place of banishment for dissenters in the order.

But Campion still exists, and actually seems to be thriving on the publicity that all the shit hitting fans gives it. Needless to say, it's no longer Jesuit, but it's in what it takes to be their traditional spirit.

Here's their website:

http://www.campion-college.org/

Here's an article from the 'National Review' telling the story:

http://www.nationalreview.com/contributors/kurtz031302.shtml

 

How can this be??

Acccording to the Website: "Campion College of San Francisco is a two-year college with an integrated Catholic liberal arts, great books curriculum designed to prepare students to transfer into a four-year university of their choice. It offers a single degree: Catholic Humanities." How can this be, the college is CA Approved, and not accredited. How can the two years transfer to a four year school, and have all credits accepted, unless it is another CA Appoved/State Approved school. The reason I say this is that I've been told by numerious forum members that my CA Approved Degree from Pacific Western will be utterly useless in transferring to RA/NA schools, and has a zero acceptence rate. Therefore, would not Campion's transfer model fly in the face of the logic so many have stated on this board for so long, or is the school misleading? As a recent Catholic convert, I would hate to think that this is the case.

 

Re: How can this be??

Perhaps (I don't personally know) they offer a legitimate course of instruction. Perhaps they have agreements with other schools. Perhaps they have had success in placing their students. Perhaps this is a Bob Jones-type situation. Perhaps they have a goal to become accredited, and this was a forward-looking statement.

None of the above applies to Pacific Western University.

 

Re: How can this be??

No. See below:

"Although Campion is not yet formally accredited, it has established affiliation agreements with Ave Maria University, Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, and the pontifical International Theological Institute in Gaming, Austria, whereby graduates will be accepted for transfer at those institutions."

So it is possible to transfer to 4-year schools in a *very* limited manner.

Now all Pacific Western needs to do is create affiliations with obscure, Catholic universities...



Tom Nixon

 

"Perhaps (I don't personally know) they offer a legitimate course of instruction. Perhaps they have agreements with other schools. Perhaps they have had success in placing their students. Perhaps this is a Bob Jones-type situation. Perhaps they have a goal to become accredited, and this was a forward-looking statement.

None of the above applies to Pacific Western University."
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PW (CA Approved) Business Programs/courses meets the same BPPVC process, at this time, as Campion.

PW never claims to have a student placement service, nor, religious affilliation.

PW is clear in all literature, that they are not accredited.

Outside of business, the other programs the school has fall under the HI state registration operation (Aviation, Sciences, etc.).

Less utility than RA, Perhaps. Worth an attack? ....

 

But the CA state approval is relaxed enough to encompass a variety of different things, isn't it?

What Campion brings to the table is the already established reputation of the St. Ignatius Institute at the University of San Francisco. Campion incorporates that institute's program and most of its faculty. It also has had some influential backing, including Cardinal Schonborn, the archbishop of Vienna, and Ignatius Press, a Catholic publisher known to every Catholic academic, I'm sure. Even the controversy surrounding the school's creation helps to ensure that it is widely known, particularly in conservative and/or traditionalist Catholic circles. Finally, I'm sure that Campion intends to apply for regional accreditation as soon as it is possible to do so.

But despite these advantages that most state-approved schools don't share, Campion still feels the need to set up transfer aggreements with other schools. Personally, I suspect that there are many more schools out there that would accept a Campion transfer on a case-by-case basis, but those would probably be special-admissions and can't be counted on.

What this illustrates is the opposite of the point that you are trying to make, RJT. Even with all the advantages of a ready-made reputation, a state-approved school is still going to be at a disadvantage when transferring credit. Just imagine the disadvantage when schools don't have any of those advantages.

 

Campion is, I feel confident in predicting, a sure thing for getting candidacy and then full accreditation from a regional accreditor as soon as it meets the time-in-business standard.

Pacific Western and Kennedy-Western are, I feel confident in predicting, a sure thing for never getting candidacy from a regional accreditor.

That's the main difference I see, and also, I think, the reason many GAAP-accredited schools will consider accepting Campion credits and their degree now.

 

Thanks, Bill. That was a very interesting article in the National Review. I am sorry I missed protestors chanting in Latin - certainly a rarity!