Biola University has long been known for its conviction and courage.
Conviction is what keeps us anchored to our core beliefs and our century-strong mission of biblically centered education. Courage is what spurs us to innovate and take on new challenges. At Biola, we recognize that both are as essential to our future as they have been to our past.
Conviction without courage goes nowhere. Courage without conviction goes anywhere. But conviction with courage goes somewhere. On this website, you will find the bold vision for what that “somewhere” will look like for Biola University in the years ahead, as we press on toward new heights as a global leader in Christian higher education.
As we move courageously forward with a bold university plan, we are working diligently to keep the cost of improving a Biola education off the backs of our students. We are working together for the students, to equip them to become the intellectual and spiritual leaders that our world so desperately needs, for the purpose of impacting the world for the Lord Jesus Christ.
I hope you will be encouraged to read further about our University Plan on this website, exploring the ways that you can be involved in supporting the exciting ventures and improvements on the horizon for Biola.
Blessings in Christ,
Barry H. Corey, President
The mission of Biola University is biblically centered education, scholarship and service—equipping men and women in mind and character to impact the world for the Lord Jesus Christ.
Truth. Transformation. Testimony.
We will be a Christ-centered university distinguished for upholding an integrative biblical worldview through our leadership, scholarship, curriculum, teaching, service, and voice. We will be a trustworthy advocate for biblical thinking in higher education, blending faith and learning for students to receive the highest quality education integrated with the eternal truth that Christ is Lord of all.
We will attract and retain the finest Christian faculty who genuinely share the theological convictions, mission, vision and values of the University. We will develop our faculty as whole-person teachers and scholars who care deeply about our students and whose scholarship makes a difference for good in the world.
We will facilitate Christ-like discipleship in our community and a commitment to Gospel proclamation in word and deed. We will position ourselves at the forefront of spiritual development research and assessment and in so doing advance the understanding that students’ education is an education of mind and heart.
We will prepare students as courageous, neighbor-loving followers of Christ, who are exceptionally well prepared for their professional careers. Our students will be intentional about Christ’s command first to love God and then to love their neighbor, and will be redemptive voices grasping and being grasped by the challenges of our world.
Biola will attract and advance a community of cross-cultural, globally aware Christians learning from one another so that the University will reflect the breadth and grace of God’s kingdom. As a result, our La Mirada campus community will more closely reflect the demographics of our geographic region. We will also prepare our students to be intellectually and experientially cross-cultural Christians, effectively able to live out the gospel in diverse settings and provide servant leadership across the world.
Biola University will make our educational resources accessible across the nation and throughout the world through curricular development, technology, new sites and strategic partnerships. In so doing, we will be part of a global learning community where we will serve to gain as much as we serve to provide.
Biola University will actively address the issue of college affordability, striving to reduce the burden of student debt and financial sacrifice of our students and, in many cases, their supportive families. By focusing on affordability, we will make a Biola education more attainable without diminishing its exemplary quality.
Fulfilling these aspirations in the ever-changing landscape of higher education will require a multi-dimensional strategy: strengthening our traditional campus-based programs, extending our reach through new technological means of educational delivery, excelling still more in biblically integrative scholarship that impacts the world for the Lord Jesus Christ, and making our most beneficial educational resources accessible to as many people as possible.
Below is a sampling of some progress resulting from our University Plan.
We encourage you to check back often to learn more about the exciting things happening at Biola.
Center for Christian Thought
Biola University's Center for Christian Thought is a residential fellowship program that brings together leading Christian thinkers from around the world for several months at a time to research and discuss issues of significance to the academy, the church, and the broader culture.
Open Biola
An innovative service to the world, Open Biola offers open access to some of the most beneficial learning resources from Biola University’s professors and guest contributors — including class sessions, conferences, chapels, blog posts, papers, articles and more — in one easy-to-navigate website. Visitors are able to search, stream, download, discuss and share more than 1,000 individual resources, all for free.
The site was launched in August 2012 as a complement to Biola’s existing presence on other content delivery destinations such as iTunes U and YouTube, and is a product of Biola’s aspiration to extend its educational resources throughout the world. As a source of thoughtful Christian perspectives on topics ranging from business and science to philosophy and theology, Open Biola aims to serve the needs of the global Christian community by upholding and fostering a biblically centered worldview.
Mosaic Cultural Center
Scheduled to open in the Spring of 2013, the Mosaic Cultural Center at Biola University represents a concrete commitment to the advancement of the University Plan and the aspiration to “Nurture a Cross-Cultural Community” for all students. Through the Office of Multi-Ethnic Program Development and the Center for Cross Cultural Engagement, the Mosaic Cultural Center will seek to reflect intentional diversity, international study programs, and urban engagement.
Online Programs
Biola's high quality online programs and courses ensure that student learning accomplished through the Internet reflects the university's high academic standards — all with the convenience of studying at home, or anywhere in the world, at flexible times that suit busy schedules.
Lowest Tuition Increases in Recorded History
The University has a multi-faceted plan to ensure the affordability of a Biola education and a key facet of that plan is tuition. For the past two years, Biola's net tuition increases have been just 2.66% per year, lower than the national average and are the lowest in recorded institutional history.
Enhanced Commitment to Spiritual Development
Expanding on Biola University's commitment to the spiritual development of its students, the university has invested in two new leadership roles within the Office of Student Development. These new roles, the Associate Dean of Spiritual Development and the Director of Spiritual Formation, will work to implement the university's vision in the areas of outreach and service learning, pastoral care and spiritual direction, dorm and commuter spiritual life, as well as spiritual leadership training.
Center for Christianity, Culture, & the Arts
Scheduled to open in the 2013-2014 academic year, Biola’s Center for Christianity, Culture and the Arts celebrates the role and promise of the arts by representing truth and beauty to a world wrought with relativism. Through the Center, Biola University will enable artists and academics from around the world to collaborate on defining the intersection of faith and art, advancing the University Plan’s aspiration to “Attract and Develop the Best and Brightest Christian Scholars.” In addition, the Center for Christianity, Culture and the Arts will host a yearly arts symposium, a regional art conference, summer workshops for CCCA faculty, and an artist-in-residence.
$3.1 Million Set Aside for Additional Scholarships