Loyola University of New Orleans will reopen for the spring semester, Loyola President Fr. Kevin Wildes told a gathering of Loyola alumni, students, faculty and parents Wednesday evening.
The gathering is one in a series of national alumni chapter tours Wildes has been giving since October.
“We are already recruiting a class for next year,” Wildes said. The university will resume operations on Jan. 9.
Wildes, who served as a Georgetown chaplain and faculty member for 11 years before moving to Loyola in 2004, joined those in attendance in warmly thanking Georgetown for its hospitality toward the 52 Loyola students it took in when Hurricane Katrina forced the New Orleans university to close.
Loyola was fortunate to have sustained so little damage, Wildes said. The hurricane’s flood waters barely reached the edge of campus. Only the university’s recreation facility suffered when the hurricane’s winds tore the skylights from its roof.
“People of New Orleans have always known the risks associated with where they are, but the people who make up Loyola are what give me hope to meet the challenges ahead,” Wildes said.
Hospitals, drug stores, groceries and restaurants in the university’s surrounding neighborhood have all resumed operation, Wildes said.
With assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Wildes is working to find alternative housing for returning students, as well as faculty and staff, many of whom lost their homes in the hurricane’s floods.
Students at Wednesday’s meeting raised concerns about everything from the quality of drinking water in New Orleans to whether or not their Georgetown grades would transfer.
But student response to the prospect of returning was for the most part positive. Replies to a Loyola-sponsored online survey indicated that many plan to come back for classes in January.
Additionally, many students returned to Loyola during its “re-entry” event last weekend to retrieve belongings abandoned in dorms when the storm hit.
Although he acknowledges the risks and challenges ahead for the university, Wildes remains optimistic about the school’s future. Unlike other universities in the area, Loyola has stayed financially strong and physically intact, well positioned to reach out and help its injured community.
“We view the university as a corporate citizen that will help build the city and the region in a new way,” Wildes said. “We will build New Orleans better-better than it was before.”
