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The top of a Loyola University Chicago building, with campus scenery, on a sunny day.

Mission and Identity

About the College of Arts and Sciences

The College of Arts and Sciences is the oldest of Loyola University Chicago’s 15 schools, colleges, and institutes. More than 150 years since its founding, the College is home to 20 academic departments and 36 interdisciplinary programs and centers, more than 450 full-time faculty, and nearly 8,000 students. 
 
The 2,000+ classes that we offer each semester span an array of intellectual pursuits, ranging from the natural sciences and computational sciences to the humanities, the social sciences, and the fine and performing arts. Our students and faculty are engaged internationally at our campus in Rome, Italy, as well as at dozens of University-sponsored study abroad and research sites around the world.  
 
Home to the departments that anchor the University’s Core Curriculum, the College seeks to prepare all of Loyola’s students to think critically, to engage with the world of the 21st century at ever-deepening levels, and to become caring and compassionate individuals. Our faculty, staff, and students view service to others not just as one option among many, but as a constitutive dimension of their very being. In the truest sense of the Jesuit ideal, our graduates strive to be “individuals for others.” 

Our Mission

Through the University's Core Curriculum and its majors and minors, the College of Arts and Sciences is dedicated to the Jesuit tradition of a Transformative Education within the disciplines of humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences disciplines. We encourage our students to acquire, experience, and reflect on acquired knowledge and then decide what it means for them in terms of individual choice, action, commitment, and service to others. For more information, visit:

Our Identity

Loyola University Chicago’s College of Arts and Sciences is the heart of the University. The core Judeo-Christian tradition of affirming the dignity of the human person before God is embodied in this college. In the undergraduate setting, students develop their intellectual discipline and their awareness of past and present dimensions of human culture, confirm their dedication to others, and strengthen their courage to build a future for humanity. Science and technology, language, literature and fine arts, theology and philosophy, history and communication skills, and a variety of social sciences-- these fields all have distinct yet complementary roles in developing students to fuller adulthood. As a result, each student may bring knowledge and disciplined competence to help solve the problems of their communities, cities, nation, and world.

Loyola’s College of Arts and Sciences finds its identity in its own distinctive history, characterized by more than 150 years of service to greater Chicagoland, the Midwest, and beyond.

CAS reflects many years of loyal service from hundreds of dedicated faculty, staff, and administrators. They all carry Loyola’s sense of tradition, the zeal to collaborate with students, and the hope that Loyola’s educational values and ideals are being planted throughout the world in the daily lives of its graduates. These graduates are the continuing evidence of the spirit of the College of Arts and Sciences of Loyola University Chicago—a spirit that grows out of the college’s core curriculum.

The College of Arts and Sciences is the oldest of Loyola University Chicago’s 15 schools, colleges, and institutes. More than 150 years since its founding, the College is home to 20 academic departments and 36 interdisciplinary programs and centers, more than 450 full-time faculty, and nearly 8,000 students. 
 
The 2,000+ classes that we offer each semester span an array of intellectual pursuits, ranging from the natural sciences and computational sciences to the humanities, the social sciences, and the fine and performing arts. Our students and faculty are engaged internationally at our campus in Rome, Italy, as well as at dozens of University-sponsored study abroad and research sites around the world.  
 
Home to the departments that anchor the University’s Core Curriculum, the College seeks to prepare all of Loyola’s students to think critically, to engage with the world of the 21st century at ever-deepening levels, and to become caring and compassionate individuals. Our faculty, staff, and students view service to others not just as one option among many, but as a constitutive dimension of their very being. In the truest sense of the Jesuit ideal, our graduates strive to be “individuals for others.” 

Through the University's Core Curriculum and its majors and minors, the College of Arts and Sciences is dedicated to the Jesuit tradition of a Transformative Education within the disciplines of humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences disciplines. We encourage our students to acquire, experience, and reflect on acquired knowledge and then decide what it means for them in terms of individual choice, action, commitment, and service to others. For more information, visit:

Loyola University Chicago’s College of Arts and Sciences is the heart of the University. The core Judeo-Christian tradition of affirming the dignity of the human person before God is embodied in this college. In the undergraduate setting, students develop their intellectual discipline and their awareness of past and present dimensions of human culture, confirm their dedication to others, and strengthen their courage to build a future for humanity. Science and technology, language, literature and fine arts, theology and philosophy, history and communication skills, and a variety of social sciences-- these fields all have distinct yet complementary roles in developing students to fuller adulthood. As a result, each student may bring knowledge and disciplined competence to help solve the problems of their communities, cities, nation, and world.

Loyola’s College of Arts and Sciences finds its identity in its own distinctive history, characterized by more than 150 years of service to greater Chicagoland, the Midwest, and beyond.

CAS reflects many years of loyal service from hundreds of dedicated faculty, staff, and administrators. They all carry Loyola’s sense of tradition, the zeal to collaborate with students, and the hope that Loyola’s educational values and ideals are being planted throughout the world in the daily lives of its graduates. These graduates are the continuing evidence of the spirit of the College of Arts and Sciences of Loyola University Chicago—a spirit that grows out of the college’s core curriculum.