Recently, I made the two-hour drive from Boston to visit St. Joseph’s College in Maine, located fifteen miles northwest of the booming city of Portland. It was cloudy, and then the skies erupted in a downpour, so my photos don’t quite do the campus justice, but trust me — St. Joseph’s campus is both beautiful and immense. Its 474 acres consist mostly of woods and fields but as a bonus, it shares a shoreline with Sebago Lake, the largest lake in a state full of lakes.
The college dates back to 1912 –one of seventeen campuses founded by the Sisters of Mercy. NECHE accredits three of those, including Salve Regina in Rhode Island and the University of St. Joseph’s in Connecticut.
The spirit of the Sisters (four of whom serve on St. Joseph’s Board of Trustees) and their commitment to serving the poor, sick, and uneducated is amply evident on campus– and not simply in chapels and statuary.
St. Joseph’s is a member of the Maine Campus Compact (a group of colleges focused on community service) and offers its students the opportunity to participate in both national and global service projects. While renowned for its schools of Nursing and Education, St. Joseph’s also offers degrees in Business, Health, Exercise Science, Theology, Social Science and the Humanities, and the hard sciences.
Part of the Environmental Science program is a semester-long scientific expedition that places students in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, Fundy National Park in New Brunswick, Canada, or along the coast of Maine aboard a 72-foot schooner. Given my propensity for seasickness, I’d definitely choose New Brunswick, which remains high on my bucket list.
I was able to spend some time with President Joseph Cassidy, named 15th President of the college in July 2023. Joe has been involved in education for over 30 years: serving as a grade school teacher; high school teacher; college professor; college President in the Maine Community College System for more than a decade; President of SMCC, Maine’s largest community college; and President of Washington County Community College. Clearly, St. Joseph’s is blessed with a steady and experienced hand at the helm!
We were able to grab lunch in the college’s dining hall and I witnessed Joe’s delight being with and among students…and the feeling was obviously mutual. In August, most of the students were athletes training on campus early, so I saw multiple signs of St. Joseph’s college nickname — aptly titled The Monks, of course!
