About City College

The Past: A History of Educating Adult Learners

Evening courses were first offered at Loyola University New Orleans in 1917 as part of the School of Commerce and Finance. Evening classes allowed young adults to work during the day to support their families and take courses in the evening. Loyola’s 1918-1919 bulletin indicates that many of these first programs were open “equally to men and women” to study part time. By 1949, the demand for such courses prompted the university to establish an Evening Division. Then, in 1970, the Evening Division was chartered as City College, with its own full-time faculty and 1,200 students.

City College became a well-known brand, providing a Jesuit education at an affordable price to post-traditional students. Over the course of its history, City College offered a number of undergraduate and graduate degrees focused on professional skills, including several associate degrees. In 2006, with the region still recovering from Hurricane Katrina, the university restructured and dissolved City College. Each college at Loyola assumed responsibility for educating its undergraduate adult students, and City College faculty transitioned to departments in the respective academic units. 

The Present: Evolving to Meet Your Needs

The pandemic of the early 2020s taught us that online learning is more important than ever. But more importantly, the world came to respect that online education is real education.

Today, City College is back as the online arm of Loyola University New Orleans. Loyola's City College serves the needs of adult learners in our community and beyond. Loyola has recruited Dr. Paul Cesarini as Dean of Online and City College. Dr. Cesarini and the City College team are leveraging the strength of Loyola's schools of Nursing and Health, Business, Law, Arts and Sciences, and Music and Media to develop new fully-online programs and rethink existing ones. Current plans include re-launching several fully online two-year degree programs, re-tooling our undergraduate online degree programs to better facilitate degree-completers, developing online graduate certificate programs, and linking those to our existing online graduate degrees.

City College is expanding the Professional and Continuing Education portfolio at Loyola, which offers an array of short and long-term certificates and programs. These "stackable" credentials allow working professionals to add to their knowledge base, qualify for promotions, and build toward associate degrees in fields including healthcare, cyber security, human resources, and more.

The Future: Post-Traditional and Beyond

Where will the future of learning for post-traditional students be? Research suggests that the need for online learning will continue to grow for three reasons.

• FLEXIBILITY: Online learning offers a high degree of flexibility through asynchronous learning options that allow students to complete work on any schedule. Thanks to advancing technology, virtual learning can provide the same classes from the same professors as in-person learning. 
   
• ACCESSIBILITY: Another reason that learners of all ages are looking online is convenience. How else can you have access to some of the most exciting, creative and insightful minds in education, right in your living room?
   
• COST: Online learning offers a great value. Students can opt for pay-as-you-go options, building towards their degree with all of the perks of a full-time Loyola student. When you graduate, you earn a Loyola University degree. And that is priceless.