Part Four: A Growing Impact

Since it enrolled its first students in 1951, St. John Fisher College has been a significant contributor to the greater Rochester area, and to all of New York state. In the years ahead, its contribution, for several reasons, is likely to increase.

As of the summer of 2019 (as noted in Part Two), St. John Fisher College had 28,028 living alumni – an increase of 7.3 percent since 2015. Of this total, 58.3 percent lived in the greater Rochester area, with another 21.5 percent living elsewhere in New York state. With more than 1,000 students each year earning undergraduate or graduate degrees at Fisher, the number of Fisher alumni living in the Rochester area and elsewhere in New York is likely to keep growing for the next several years.

Moreover, with continued growth in the number of recent Fisher graduates living in the Rochester area and elsewhere in New York, graduates of the College are especially well-represented among the region's and the state's younger adult workforce – the well-educated 25-to-45-year-old workers so critical to the vitality and adaptability of New York's economy.

Fisher's contribution to the ongoing development of the region's and the state's human capital is not, however, simply a matter of overall numbers. The College has been notably responsive to ongoing changes in New York's economy and in the wider world, with new undergraduate degree programs in fields such as data science, cybersecurity, sustainability, and interactive media, and new resources such as the Parkes Trading Lab. Its professional programs in education, business, nursing and pharmacy (one of only five schools of pharmacy in New York) each year produce graduates who are ready for rewarding careers – and ready to help the state and the region address major challenges in areas such as elementary and secondary education, the future of family business, and the cost and quality of health care.

At the same time, St. John Fisher College continues to serve as one of Monroe County's and the greater Rochester area's anchor institutions – a significant enterprise in its own right, and an active participant in efforts to strengthen the region's economy, to address community needs, and to ensure that the Rochester area is a safe, healthy, and vibrant place to live and work.