“A Catholic, Mercy-rooted liberal arts college in the Allegheny Mountains, known for nursing and the health professions.”
Mount Aloysius College is a small private Catholic liberal arts institution founded in 1853 by the Sisters of Mercy, a community whose origins trace back to Catherine McAuley in 19th-century Ireland and to a small group of sisters who arrived in Pittsburgh in 1843 and settled in the central Pennsylvania mountains soon after. After more than a century operating as an academy and then a junior college, Mount Aloysius transitioned exclusively to higher education in 1961 and today educates roughly 2,900 undergraduates from a 165-acre wooded campus in Cresson, Pennsylvania, perched in the Allegheny Mountains about 80 miles east of Pittsburgh and a short drive from Altoona and Johnstown. The college is best known for its health-professions programs — most prominently the Bachelor of Science in Nursing, which is offered in traditional, accelerated second-degree, and RN-to-BSN tracks and is accredited by ACEN — alongside diagnostic medical sonography, radiography, surgical technology, and physical therapist assistant degrees. Beyond the health sciences, Mount Aloysius offers strong programs in education (with PA teacher certification across early childhood, middle, secondary, and special education), business and accounting (including an MBA), criminology with forensic-investigation and cybersecurity tracks, psychology, and biology with multiple pre-professional pathways. With a 7:1 student-to-faculty ratio, classes are small and faculty access is the norm rather than the exception. Life at Mount Aloysius is intentionally residential and community-oriented. Five residence halls — Ihmsen, St. Gertrude, St. Joseph, Misciagna, and McAuley — house students, with Ihmsen serving as the primary first-year hall and Misciagna offering suite-style living. The Mounties compete in NCAA Division III as a member of the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference (AMCC), and the campus's Mercy heritage shapes a culture grounded in service, hospitality, and mentorship of working-class and first-generation students from Pennsylvania, the surrounding Appalachian region, and a small contingent of international students.
Visa, OPT, H-1B alumni outcomes, and acceptance rates by country — sourced from FOIA, USCIS H-1B Hub, and DHS SEVIS.
Regional Colleges North
US News Best Colleges 2026
Test Optional — You can submit scores if they help your case, but they're not required.
Official SourceRolling Admission
Mount Aloysius uses rolling admission with no fixed regular-decision deadline; applications are reviewed as received.
The deep admissions playbook beyond the headline acceptance rate — round-by-round breakdowns, nationality data, requirements, and contact paths.
Tuition & Fees (All Students)
$27,000 – $28,600
/yr
Beyond the sticker price — every named scholarship, the financial aid policy, need-aware notes, and a personalized net-cost estimate.
How life on campus actually feels — clubs, sports, traditions, housing realities, and how the school integrates with its city.
Mount Aloysius's flagship division, offering ACEN-accredited associate (ASN), traditional BSN, accelerated/second-degree BSN, and RN-to-BSN pathways with extensive clinical placements at regional hospitals.
Houses the college's other signature health programs, with strong job-placement outcomes in central Pennsylvania healthcare systems.
Undergraduate business programs and an MBA with concentrations in accounting, non-profit management, and project management; healthcare administration links business with the college's clinical strengths.
Pennsylvania-certified teacher preparation across early childhood, middle level (4-8), secondary, and special education, with subject-area concentrations.
B.A. in Criminology with applied tracks tied to regional law-enforcement and federal partners.
Biology with pre-med, pre-pharmacy, pre-dental, pre-PA, and pre-PT tracks, plus natural resource management and conservation law enforcement.
4 years
An eight-semester ACEN-accredited program blending two years of liberal arts and sciences with 17 months of intensive nursing coursework and clinical rotations across regional health systems. Graduates take the NCLEX-RN with consistently strong pass rates.
1.5 years
A 16-month intensive pathway for students who already hold a non-nursing baccalaureate degree, designed to move career-changers from prior-degree to NCLEX-RN eligibility quickly.
4 years
A practitioner-oriented program with specializations in forensic investigation and cybersecurity, taught alongside criminal justice agencies in the region.
Where alumni go after graduation — top industries, grad-school continuation, and the qualitative outcomes story.
Sticker price (annual, out-of-state): $27,072
Net-cost estimate is US-resident-only — international applicants are typically excluded from need-based aid at most schools and should treat the sticker price as the planning baseline.
