Sister Maureen Fay Receives
Honorary Degree from Holy Cross
June 11, Worcester, Massachusetts – In recognition of her “tireless and lasting contributions to Catholic higher education,” Sister Maureen Fay, OP, received an honorary degree, Doctor of Ministry, honoris causa, from the College of the Holy Cross during the Jesuit college’s 163rd commencement exercises, held May 22. Founded in 1843 and the oldest Catholic college in New England, the College of the Holy Cross honored Sister Maureen as an “educator, administrator, woman of faith and work, hope and compassion” and held her up as an example to their students of “leadership, conviction, and service.”
A native of Chicago, Sister Maureen entered the Adrian Dominican Congregation at the age of 17 and graduated from Siena Heights College (now University) in 1960. Through the years, Sister Maureen also earned a Master’s degree in English from the University of Detroit and a doctorate in social sciences from the University of Chicago.
She began ministry as a second-grade teacher before being transferred to Dominican High School in Detroit, where she taught English. She then went on to serve as Dean of Continuing and Graduate Studies at St. Xavier University and director of evaluation at the School for New Learning at De Paul University, both in Chicago. She was also an associate professor at both the University of Illinois-Chicago and Siena Heights University in Adrian.
In 1983, Sister Maureen was named president of Mercy College in Detroit, the first non-Sister of Mercy to serve in that position. In 1990, she helped to organize the consolidation of Mercy College and a Jesuit college, the University of Detroit and was appointed as President of the University of Detroit Mercy – the first woman to serve as president of a Jesuit college. Her accomplishments there included extensive campus renovations; raising $96 million in a capital campaign; increasing enrollment to 6,000 students; overseeing a strategic planning process; and helping various academic departments to develop services to the greater Detroit community.
Sister Maureen hasn’t limited herself to running a large university. She has been involved in such community organizations as the Detroit Chamber of Commerce and the Greater Downtown Partnership. In addition, she has reached out in service to higher education, serving as chair or president of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Michigan, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Midwestern Collegiate Conference.
Sister Maureen has also been active with other colleges, as a board member for Rockhurst University in Kansas City, Missouri and the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, and also served on the Executive Committee of the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities (AJCU). Another Jesuit college – Marquette University in Milwaukee – awarded her the Marquette Degree of Doctor of Letters, honoris causa – in 2004, the year she stepped down as President of the University of Detroit Mercy.
Sister Maureen has been recognized widely for her dedication and numerous accomplishments. In 2007, she received the Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, CSC Award from the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities in recognition of her “outstanding contributions to Catholic higher education.” The Hesburgh Award – given this year to Adrian Dominican Sister Jeanne O’Laughlin, OP – is named after the 15th president of the University of Notre Dame, who served from 1952 to 1987.