New President Is Only Change at Marymount : Education: Thomas McFadden says the private, two-year college is fulfilling its mission as a place for students who may not be ready for a four-year school.

Thomas McFadden has a simple prescription for the future of Marymount College in Rancho Palos Verdes: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Of course McFadden, a lifelong educator who this weekend will be formally inaugurated as Marymount’s fifth president, probably would phrase it this way: If it is not operating dysfunctionally, do not effect repairs.

However you say it, the message is the same. McFadden thinks that Marymount, the only private, two-year liberal arts college in California, is doing exactly what it should do: offer an up-close-and-personal preliminary college education for students who, because of low high school grades, lack of English proficiency or personal reasons, just aren’t quite ready for a four-year college.

“I don’t see Marymount changing very much,” says McFadden, 57, a New York native who actually assumed the college presidency last year. “We have a very clear and I think very appropriate niche, and I really don’t see us moving away from that.”

Situated on a 30-acre campus near the southern tip of the Palos Verdes Peninsula, with a breathtaking view of the ocean and Catalina Island, Marymount is home to about 750 full-time students and about 80 full- and part-time faculty members. Classes are small--the average is 17 students per class, the maximum 35--and students graduate after two years with an associate of arts degree. With tuition at about $11,500 per year, it isn’t cheap, but McFadden points out that it is comparable to private, four-year colleges. About 90% of the school’s funding comes from tuition.

Founded in 1932 as a two-year liberal arts college for women--the first Catholic junior college in the state--it was then situated on Sunset Boulevard near UCLA. It was accredited as a four-year college in the late 1940s, but in the 1960s, after moving to the Palos Verdes Peninsula, its four-year program was merged with Loyola University to form Loyola Marymount University. Two-year Marymount College remained on the peninsula and moved to its current location in 1975.

Although the college is affiliated with the Catholic church, only about half the students come from Catholic backgrounds, McFadden said. About 52% are women and 48% men.

According to McFadden, Marymount students fall into three general categories.

About 27% are international students, many from Asian countries. In the past five years, students from 30 countries have attended Marymount, with Japan sending by far the largest contingent. (The 1992 riots and the perception of the Los Angeles area as dangerous, however, have resulted in a sharp drop-off in Japanese students, from six three years ago to 54 this year.)

“We have a very good English-as-a-second-language program,” McFadden said. “It’s a good first stop for them.”

Another quarter of the students, McFadden said, are “generally good students from high schools in this area who for whatever reason want to stay in the area or perhaps aren’t sure yet what they want to do.” For those students, he said, two years at Marymount can give them a clearer idea of their interests when they transfer to a four-year college, as 95% of Marymount students eventually do.

By far the largest category of Marymount students--about 50%--are “students with not-so-good high school grades or SAT scores, who perhaps have been turned down at the four-year institutions they wanted to attend,” McFadden said. He added: “If they do well here they will be able to transfer to that institution. For many students this is a second chance, after high school, to get into the college environment.”