Silver Lake College of the Holy Family

Silver Lake College of the Holy Family is a dynamic learning community that empowers students through a quality liberal arts education integrated with professional preparation offered in an environment of mutual respect and concern for persons, based on the principles and truths of Franciscan Catholic tradition.

Silver College of the Holy Family is a comprehensive Franciscan Catholic college offering a wide array of undergraduate and graduate degrees through the Schools of Education, Liberal Arts, and Professional Studies.

Silver Lake College of the Holy Family is a dynamic learning community that empowers students through a quality liberal arts education integrated with professional preparation offered in an environment of mutual respect and concern for persons, based on the principles and truths of Franciscan Catholic tradition.

Silver Lake College of the Holy Family will be known as a Franciscan Catholic college dedicated to developing students to serve, lead, and transform our world. Our future will be centered on educating the whole person in an environment that celebrates teaching and learning, integrates our Franciscan values in all that we do, and delivers on a promise of quality liberal arts education and professional preparation.

Silver Lake College believes diversity is integral to the educational and developmental experience of all learners. As a college community, we strive to be inclusive, recognizing and valuing opportunities to integrate dimensions of diversity in broadening our interpretation and understanding of humanity. We respect and uphold the many facets of human identity in helping support and strengthen our college mission, vision and values.

Silver Lake College of the Holy Family is a private, liberal arts college offering 21 undergraduate majors. Students also have many opportunities for educational enhancement through extra-curricular activities. College faculty and staff offer support every step of the way. Students receive help with the admissions process, understanding financial aid benefits and enrolling in courses. Once enrolled, freshmen are offered support through such programs as Learning Communities, Academic Resources and Student Life. These are just a few of the ways that Silver Lake College of the Holy Family helps give students a successful and rewarding experience.

As an international student, whether you are entering an undergraduate or graduate level program, your needs are different from a regular student's. Silver Lake College of the Holy Family is committed to making your pursuit of higher education an affordable reality. At Silver Lake College of the Holy Family, a private college experience is within your reach, especially with the help of financial aid. Significant educational funding is available to eligible students from federal, state, institutional and private sources.

A Silver College of the Holy Family education provides a strong liberal arts foundation and solid career preparation. All undergraduate students take a specific number of credits in the Liberal Arts Core. These include courses in writing, mathematics, the natural and social sciences, humanities, philosophy, and theology/religious studies.

Interwoven in the vision and mission of Silver College of the Holy Family is experiential learning. Experiential learning is the process of taking what each Silver College of the Holy Family student is learning in the classroom and providing them with career related experiences such as internships, on-campus jobs, clinicals, practicums and student teaching. Each of these opportunities provides the student with hands-on work experience that prepares them for careers and helps build each student’s resume. During each experience the student has the support of a faculty, staff and host supervisor who helps each student reflect on each career related experience and assists them with relating the experience to their future career goal.

Silver Lake College of the Holy Family traces its educational foundations to 1885 when the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity established the College’s forerunner institution on Silver Lake near Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Its purpose was to prepare young women who entered the Religious Community for the apostolic work of teaching.

When many states in the 1920’s were requiring state education certificates or a degree, the Sisters were sent to teachers’ colleges to pursue academic degrees. With the Depression of the 1930’s continued education at these colleges became financially prohibited. Therefore, the Superior of the Community, Mother Generose Cahill, proceeded to have a wing constructed at Holy Family Convent—a college. The Sisters who had attained college degrees would be the core educators of this new foundation. In 1935 Holy Family College was established.

Before lay women were admitted in 1957, nursing students from Holy Family Hospital School of Nursing attended the College by special arrangements. By the end of the decade the College admitted its first male students and became coeducational in 1969.

In 1960, a new structure was built on a 36-acre tract of land adjacent to Holy Family Convent. Becoming a separate corporation in 1972, its name was changed to Silver Lake College of the Holy Family.

As professional needs changed, programs of studies expanded: business and computer science programs, degree-completion programs, and, off campus, professional development coursework. Graduate-level programs are offered in four areas: Master of Arts in Education with focus on Teacher Leadership or Administrator Leadership, Master of Science in Leadership and Organizational Development, and Master of Music in Music Education with a focus on Kodály.