DeSales University

Welcome to DeSales University. My name is Father Jim Greenfield. I'm the president here at DeSales and I'd like to thank you for checking us out. In the next few moments, I'd just like to share a few little tidbits with you, which all revolve around what I'm going to call the DeSales difference and what it is that DeSales  University can do for you. 

If you're thinking about applying here to become a student or you are a present student or an alum - or anyone who's taking a look at us - I think these few little points will help you understand what we call the DeSales difference. 

The first one is that we are a Catholic and Salesian University. Embedded in everything we do - whether it's academic, professional, athletic, whatever - we do it through the lens of our Catholic Salesian mission. 

The Salesian piece is after St. Francis de Sales, a 16th early 17th-century Christian humanist. He's the founder, along with Saint Jane de Chantel, of the visitation of Holy Mary, a group [of nuns] who are over 400 years old and they founded the Oblates of St. Francis de Sales over 200 years ago. And we as Oblate priests and brothers and sisters around the world, we really try to imbue everyone with the principles of spirituality, which can be summed up with "Be Who You Are and Be That Well."  

And, obviously to be Catholic means to be embedded in the gospel, to be committed to the teachings of Jesus Christ, and to do that within the tradition of the Roman Catholic Church. We think that that Catholic and Salesian piece really help ground our students in a great experience of education here at DeSales.

So that would be the first one. The second one I'd like to tell you about is our faculty. They are an amazing group of women and men, many of whom have a terminal degree. They want to guide you, welcome you through the door here and then help you exit through the door at graduation with a job in hand. There are many great things that we do here in terms of our programming, be it in the liberal arts, be it in healthcare, be it criminal justice, performing arts - whatever it is we have dedicated professionals to mentor and educate people in the tradition of St. Francis de Sales and that Catholic ethos that I just spoke about. 

And the third and final piece I'd just like to share with you here today is that we're a small university with a large reach. We're here in the Lehigh Valley, a little north of Philadelphia, a little south of New York, and we're within a three-hour reach of Washington DC.

So there are lots of things that we do here in the Lehigh Valley which is very beneficial to matching it with what happens on campus, the internships or experiential learning. We also have a reach overseas for our international programming. 

So, again - we are a small, Catholic, private liberal arts university with a student focus and a global outlook with great faculty all wrapped in the Catholic Salesian tradition. That's the DeSales difference.

I look forward to welcoming you to our campus so you can see in practice what I just shared with you. Peace.