Villanova University's Center for Church Management and Business Ethics Partners with the Archdiocese of New York
VILLANOVA, PA — Villanova University’s Center for Church Management and Business Ethics (CCMBE) at the Villanova School of Business (VSB) has come to an agreement with the Archdiocese of New York (ADNY) to offer a unique program of the Master of Science in Church Management (MSCM) for parishes of the ADNY. The terms of the agreement stipulate that the ADNY will matriculate up to 50 parishioners into the MSCM program annually for the duration of two years.
The ADNY recently launched the “Making All Things New” initiative, a strategic parish-planning program that aims to improve parishes to better serve the faithful. As part of this initiative, parishes may consolidate, and the clergy will take on greater pastoral and administrative responsibilities. Some of these administrative responsibilities will need to be delegated to qualified parish business managers. To ensure the most highly qualified business managers will manage the parishes, the ADNY turned to Villanova’s MSCM degree to obtain church management education.
“During Making All Things New, our pastoral planning process, one thing we heard over and over from both priests and parishioners was the need to help support our pastors in managing our parishes by developing stronger business practices. The Archdiocese of New York has long been a leader in supporting our pastors and parishes, which is why we are so happy to be able to partner with Villanova University to provide our parishes with the opportunity to participate in a nationally recognized master's program to train professional business managers. Business management, like so many other roles in a parish, is truly a ministry and I know that our pastors join me in expressing immense gratitude to those who serve their parishes and schools in this manner. In the next few years, I look forward to congratulating the first class of Archdiocese of New York and Villanova University trained business managers, whose service will strengthen our parishes, schools and the Church in New York,” says His Eminence, Timothy Cardinal Dolan, Archbishop of New York.
“We are delighted to welcome members of the Archdiocese of New York into our church management program,” says Charles Zech, Ph.D., faculty director for the CCMBE and director of the MSCM program. “We are dedicated to providing the best possible church management education and to help parishioners lead and serve the Church effectively. This partnership means not only that we will have a steady stream of students, but also that the Church will have a greater number of trained business professionals assisting their pastors.”
An introductory orientation will be held in NY during the spring of 2015, with the rest of the MSCM degree courses offered online, making it convenient for busy church workers wherever they reside to earn their degree. The ADNY participants will receive the same education and be taught by the same faculty members as the Villanova cohort of MSCM students. All courses have been specially developed to meet the needs of church managers. Students will take two courses each semester and graduate in two years.
VSB was recognized among the top schools on the U.S. News & World Report’s annual “Best Online Degree Programs: Graduate Business” ranking, earning the #6 spot in the U.S. In addition to #6 overall, VSB also scored well in the “Student Services and Technology” category coming in at #4, and in the “Student Engagement” category at #8.
For more information on the MSCM program at Villanova, click here.
The Villanova School of Business (VSB) is ranked #24 in the nation by Bloomberg Businessweek and has been at the forefront of business education since it was founded in 1922. Serving over 2,500 undergraduate and graduate students, VSB is home to six Centers of Excellence (the Daniel M. DiLella Center for Real Estate, the Center for Business Analytics, the Center for Global Leadership, the Center for Marketing & Consumer Insights, the Center for Church Management & Business Ethics and the Center for Innovation, Creativity, and Entrepreneurship (ICE) Center) with each center designed to foster innovative, cross-disciplinary research and teaching opportunities for business faculty. VSB is known for academic rigor; creativity and innovation; hands-on and service learning opportunities; a firm grounding in ethics; and an applied education that prepares students to become outstanding leaders and global citizens within the ever-changing, complex, and fast-paced world of business. For more, visit business.villanova.edu.
About Villanova University
Since 1842, Villanova University’s Augustinian Catholic intellectual tradition has been the cornerstone of an academic community in which students learn to think critically, act compassionately and succeed while serving others. There are more than 10,000 undergraduate, graduate and law students in the university’s six colleges — the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the Villanova School of Business, the College of Engineering, the College of Nursing, the College of Professional Studies and the Villanova University School of Law. As students grow intellectually, Villanova prepares them to become ethical leaders who create positive change everywhere life takes them. For more, visit www.villanova.edu.