St. Joe’s merger with USciences is approved by Middle States Commission on Higher Education

St. Joseph’s University got the green light Tuesday from an accrediting body to merge with the University of the Sciences, a plan the two schools have been working on for more than a year.

The boards of the two Philadelphia universities voted to approve the plan last summer.

The approval from Middle States is among about a dozen federal and state regulatory and accreditation reviews or notifications that the schools have undertaken, but certainly the most significant. The rest are “progressing nicely” and were dependent upon the Middle States decision, said Cheryl McConnell, St. Joe’s provost.

“So it’s a big day,” she said.

The merger takes effect June 1, and USciences will no longer have degree-granting authority as of Dec. 31, under the plan approved.

» READ MORE: St. Joe's and University of the Sciences vote to proceed with a merger

The 200-year-old USciences, formerly Philadelphia College of Pharmacy — the nation’s first pharmacy college — will merge into St. Joseph’s, a 170-year-old Jesuit institution. St. Joseph’s will be the name of the combined institution. The USciences’ historic Philadelphia College of Pharmacy will retain its name, though it will be under the College of Health Professions, one of four schools and colleges that will exist under the reorganization, McConnell said. The three others are the College of Arts and Sciences, Haub School of Business, and the School of Education and Human Development, a new one that will house clinical mental health, counseling, social work, and other areas, she said.

Mark C. Reed, president of St. Joseph’s, will become president of the combined institution. Paul Katz, who had been president of USciences, retired in July. Valerie Weil, the university’s chief financial and operating officer, has been serving as interim president.

The merger also has meant some job losses. Twenty-two of USciences’ more than 170 full-time faculty members were not offered jobs, and five others were offered only one-year contracts, McConnell said. Those not being retained are being given one-year severance, she said.

There likely will be some staff cuts, too, but those have not been finalized, she said.

» READ MORE: St, Joseph's and Usiences have proposed a merger

In February 2021, the schools announced that they were looking at a potential merger to help them grow and thrive in an increasingly challenging higher-education market. Combined, the institutions will enroll more than 9,000 undergraduate and graduate students, employ nearly 450 faculty, and have an endowment in excess of a half-billion dollars, an operating budget over $300 million, assets of $1.2 billion, and nearly 95,000 living alumni.

St. Joseph’s had been looking to add health-care programs, but it was USciences, which has faced financial challenges, that approached St. Joe’s, noting proximity, complementary programs, and similar graduation and retention rates.

Both campuses, which are less than five miles apart, will be retained. The St. Joseph’s campus, which straddles the Philadelphia/Lower Merion border, will be known as the Hawk Hill campus and USciences in West Philadelphia will become the University City campus, the provost said. The campuses are integrating student activities and academics across the campuses.

“We’ll have buses that go back and forth,” she said.