ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews family-friendly policies at Catholic colleges and universities, and thus its scope and focuses differ slightly from other reviews that have not exclusively addressed this unique institutional context. Research on family-friendly policies in Catholic colleges and universities is long overdue. The literature on family-friendly policies that differentiates the liberal arts college from the larger, comprehensive university is instructive in understanding how to contextualize the policy landscape at this subset of colleges and universities. At comprehensive colleges and universities, which in program and degree conferral can be comparable to the medium master's-granting Catholic institutions, family-friendly policies were limited, less clear, and not as readily accessible to faculty. It is not enough for universities to simply offer family-friendly policies. Therefore the authors broadened their definition of family-friendly policies to include categories such as tuition and housing assistance and childcare and lactation facilities.
