Looking Back at 2023, Looking Forward to 2024

This past year marked a period of significant growth for Come to Believe. In 2023, we welcomed Butler University and University of Mount St. Vincent (UMSV) to our network—joining Arrupe College of Loyola University Chicago and Dougherty Family College of the University of St. Thomas in accompanying young people who are underrepresented at selective colleges.

CTB’s Carlos Martinez (far left) and Steve Katsouros, SJ (second from left) at the press conference announcing Butler’s new two-year college.

Butler and UMSV were both part of our 2022-2023 Design Grant cohort, CTB’s annual initiative that offers institutions the opportunity to explore our model and see if it’s a fit for their campuses. After learning more about how the CTB model provides a pathway for underserved students to receive four-year degrees, these two universities determined there was a need for two-year colleges in their communities—and that they could successfully open and sustain these colleges. 

Thanks to our generous community, CTB also celebrated raising over $1 million to support our mission at the end of 2023 through the Bezos Match. Mike and Jackie Bezos offered to donate $500,000 to our cause if other donors could match—and CTB supporters more than met the match! We’re thrilled to use this generous gift to help other higher ed institutions bring our model to their campuses.

As we kick off 2024, CTB is continuing to work with our latest cohort of Design Grant universities. Participating institutions are hard at work evaluating the feasibility of bringing the CTB model to their communities, aided by CTB’s customized support.

CTB’s 2023-2024 Design Grant cohort visited Arrupe College in October

In the coming months, Butler will hire its founding dean and move toward enrolling its inaugural class for its CTB model college in 2025. This spring, Seton College at UMSV will send out its acceptance letters for its inaugural class, who will begin their journey as Seton students in the fall. We continue to collaborate withButler and UMSV and look forward to sharing their upcoming milestones–and student success stories

Meet Jason Ford, Founding Dean of Seton College at Mount Saint Vincent

Jason Ford was working in higher education when he first learned about the Come to Believe (CTB) model. Arrupe College had just opened, and several of his coworkers forwarded a press release about the new two-year school, suggesting that his institution should consider something similar.

"I was excited about the concept then and knew there was a great need in New York for higher education institutions that could meet the needs of underserved students," says Ford. "Fast forward to today: It's amazing that I've been hired as the Founding Dean of Seton College, the new two-year school at the College of Mount Saint Vincent based on CTB’s model."

Ford's career journey to Founding Dean took several turns, but all equipped him with the skills needed to successfully launch the two-year college. Ford has worked in education for decades, including at Iona College, where he focused on student affairs and enrollment, and at various high schools as a principal and teacher. Because of this background, Ford understands what it takes to get students to enroll at Seton College and how to make their experience at the school positive.

Immediately before joining CMSV, Ford worked for the Sisters of Charity—the Roman Catholic religious congregation who founded the college—in another capacity. He served as Vice President for Properties at the Sisters’ Housing Development Corporation, where he oversaw affordable senior housing buildings. In that role, he frequently collaborated with government agencies, managed social services, and dealt with Section 8 funding. This experience will be invaluable in starting a CTB model school, which has a heavy focus on providing students with support services and government-funded financial aid.

"My new position brings together what I've spent my whole career doing while allowing me to continue serving a population that is underrepresented and overlooked," Ford shares.

As Seton College takes shape, Ford's primary focus is on fostering student success and making the school a beacon of opportunity and achievement. He has already begun hiring the college’s first staff members. While taking steps to open Seton College’s doors in Fall 2024, Ford is looking to the colleges already established under CTB’s model—Arrupe College and Dougherty Family College—as benchmarks for the type of success he'd like to achieve.

"My dream is that Seton will fulfill the mission it was set up to serve: to help students succeed," says Ford.

Butler University’s Path to a Two-Year College

Social justice is at the core of Butler University's educational mission. Founded by abolitionists in 1850, Butler holds the distinction of being the second school in Indiana and the third in the country to admit both men and women.

It was with this history of expanding educational access in mind that Brooke Barnett, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs at Butler University, and her team pursued bringing Come to Believe’s model to Butler’s campus. Barnett worked along with the school’s Transformation lab, which is devoted to finding new educational models and innovative partnerships that can advance the school into the future, to see if CTB would be a fit for Butler. 

Stephanie Hinshaw, Executive Director of the Transformation Lab, notes that CTB's model left an immediate impression because it aligned with Butler’s goal of making education more affordable.

“At Butler, we’ve long had a goal of making our school more accessible by adding a ‘$10,000 degree’ or another affordable program,” added Hinshaw. “As soon as we were introduced to the CTB model, we thought we needed to learn more and see if it would be a fit for our school.”

Butler staff joined the inaugural CTB Design Grant cohort to evaluate the feasibility of establishing a two-year college in Indianapolis. Hinshaw assembled a diverse working group of faculty and staff—a design team—to ensure all perspectives were considered during the exploration process. CTB’s resources, guidance and support enabled Barnett, Hinshaw and the design team to thoroughly examine the model.

“We had great admiration for what Come to Believe was doing, but we weren’t sure if we could pull it off,” says Barnett. “I’m so delighted that we always found ways around barriers and impediments.”

The team rigorously examined the practicalities of introducing the CTB model to Butler, including assessing its financial feasibility and determining if Butler could provide the comprehensive wrap-around support services essential to the two-year college. They also surveyed Pell Grant-eligible high schoolers in the Indianapolis area, confirming a significant demand for the CTB model and indicating that local students would benefit greatly from a new two-year college option.

At every step of the way, the Butler team turned to CTB staff for guidance and to help evaluate Butler’s plan of action. After looking at the model from every angle and developing a five-year financial plan, the Butler staff realized a two-year college was not only feasible—it was the right thing to do for their community. The college—which is yet to be named—will be housed in Butler’s existing College of Education building. Following renovations to the space, Butler will welcome its first class in the Fall of 2025.

“Higher education is meant to be a great equalizer and to help reduce generational poverty, but with rising costs, it sometimes doesn’t fulfill this mission,” says Hinshaw. “At Butler, we’re changing that. We’re thrilled that students in the Indianapolis area will soon have an affordable, accessible path to a degree.”