In any arena, given enough time, trends emerge. Emerging, in our work with Catholic schools across the country, is the reality the landscape in Catholic schools is rapidly changing. Parents are well informed savvy customers when it comes to choosing a school for their son/daughter. In some cases, the student is the one making the decision. The religious formation of the work of Catholic schools is essential. Equally, if not more important in the minds of some parents, is academic preparedness. Schools are less focused on measuring content knowledge and shifting to measuring students’ ability to collaborate, think with an entrepreneurial lens, solve complex problems, have a well-developed ability to communicate interpersonally, locally and globally and to use technology to create rather than consume. Catholic schools are unique in that they CAN offer a place that both nourishes one’s relationship with Jesus Christ and provide an environment that prepares the students for the current century in which they will live, grow, work and ultimately leave their mark. This is not to say, Catholic schools should abandon more traditional means of educating students; rather, in addition schools need to intentionally change the landscape of the learning environment to better match the college and work world the students will enter. Ultimately, the goal of any school, from an academic standpoint, is to radically increase student engagement in the learning process. Ideally, Catholic schools radically engage students as disciples and as scholars! Shifting the landscape of what space looks like for students in school is long overdue! The classrooms today resemble the classrooms of the late 1800s with some technology smattered about. Catholic schools are one of the few places that have remained relatively unchanged. We don’t need to abandon teaching the classics; however, when teaching novels such as To Kill A Mockingbird, we need to approach it in news ways that allow students to not only talk about racism but to commit to be change agents in a world still fractured by issues of race. The Catholicity of a school is ultimately what defines it; however, we also can’t ignore the fact that Catholic schools are first and foremost an academic institution that is rooted in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Schools
New Catholic School Studies on the Rise
In the past several years Meitler has seen a rise in the number of requests for us to lead new school feasibility studies. Geographically, we have partnered with diocesan, parish and lay leaders across the country in Texas, California, Michigan, Idaho, Nebraska, Louisiana, Indiana, Minnesota, Illinois, North Carolina, Florida, New Jersey, Kansas, Missouri and West Virginia.
In the Diocese of Austin, feasibility studies led to the opening of Santa Cruz Catholic School in Buda (2007and St. Dominic Savio High School (2009). In the Diocese of Boise, St. Ignatius Catholic School opened in 2017, has 452 students for 2018-19 and a capacity of 490. In the Diocese of Grand Rapids, a new elementary school, St. Robert Catholic School, opened in the 2018-19 school year with a PK-Kindergarten program and will add a grade each year to become a full elementary school. Also in 2018-19, St. Jeanne de Lestonnac High School opened its doors to 9th grade in Temecula, California. Meitler partnered with the Archdiocese of New Orleans to study the potential for sustaining a special education school, Holy Rosary School. This study led to the opening of St. Therese Academy dedicated solely to serving students with exceptional needs.
Other feasibility studies include an elementary school in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles (Simi Valley), a high school in the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, two elementary school studies in the Diocese of Austin (Leander and East Austin), a Catholic middle/high school program in Beeville, Texas, and a new early childhood education center at the Church of the Ascension in North Minneapolis.
At the present time, new school feasibility studies are being conducted in Corpus Christi, Texas (elementary school – Diocese of Corpus Christi), Galesburg, Illinois (high school – Diocese of Peoria), Houston, Texas (high school – Diocese of The Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter), Morgantown, West Virginia (private high school), Durham/Chapel Hill, North Carolina (high school – Diocese of Raleigh), and Fayetteville, North Carolina (high school – Diocese of Raleigh), Meitler will continue two additional feasibility studies with the Diocese of Raleigh in Wilmington and in the Jacksonville/New Bern/Havelock area.
In a time when we continue to hear about Catholic school consolidations, mergers and closures, the vision and passion for Catholic school education continues to thrive through new possibilities.
Exceptional Needs
As a former Catholic school principal who sat with parents seeking a Catholic education for their son/daughter who had exceptional needs the realization of the scarcity of resources in Catholic schools was often front and center. There existed a delicate balance between saying yes, enroll your son/daughter and then us doing the best we could, with saying yes enroll your son/daughter and we will invest the resources necessary to make a Catholic education accessible and of value. According to a 2017 CARA Special Report this is often the case. “…schools are [trying] to include children with disabilities, yet, only 73 percent of dioceses say that the schools’ budgets include salaries or resources related to accommodating children with disabilities in at least some of their schools.” The very mission of a Catholic education is the formation of the whole person. In the last sixty years, Apostolic Letters, Pastoral Statements and Popes have pushed for our Catholic Schools to be more inclusive and some schools are responding to the call. While as a Catholic Church we have a way to go in the special education arena there are some front runners making strides in offering options for families with a child who has an exceptional need. The Archdiocese of New Orleans’ website includes a special section for families looking for a school with a Special Needs program. https://nolacatholicschools.org/special-needs-initiative
Recently we, at Meitler, worked with the New Orleans Office for Schools. This work resulted in the opening of a new school to add to their options for families that will exclusively offer an education to children with exceptional needs. The school will open for the 2019-20 school year.
“A St. Thérèse Academy student is one with exceptional needs and/or learning differences who prefers to learn in an exclusive educational setting. Our students learn to recognize their own gifts and talents to grow spiritually, academically, physically, socially, and emotionally in an environment that supports their individual needs and fosters dignity and respect for all. Our students are not identified by a disability but rather celebrated as a unique child of God and encouraged through personalized instruction and assessment to cultivate their gifts towards success.”
By baptism, all Catholics are equal in dignity and have the same divine calling. “For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews, or Greeks, slaves or free persons, and we were all given to drink of one spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:13). This equality applies broadly to all our dealings with one another; and it applies more narrowly to the access people are given to their basic human rights. Many people in society are marginalized; and, Pope Francis asks each one of us to meet, to come to know and to include those marginalized in our communities with the goal of serving them. Our Catholic schools can, many are, and should be a place where all are welcome and included. As early as 1965, Pope Paul VI, in Gravissimum Educationis stated “All children, in virtue of their dignity as human persons, have an inalienable right to education, adapted to their ability.” In the years that followed this statement by Pope Paul VI, representatives of the Catholic Church have issued numerous documents promoting inclusion in our catechetical and academic programs with the most direct statement coming from Pope Benedict XVI. He said, “no child should be denied his or her right to an education in faith, which in turn nurtures the soul of a nation” (2008). More often administrators in our Catholic schools are enrolling students with exceptional needs even though they may think the school lacks the resources needed to fully meet the needs of children with exceptional needs. But do they truly lack the resources or does the formation of the whole child academically, spiritually, socially, emotionally, and physically make our Catholic schools, while perhaps imperfect in offering everything, the best choice.
The Hispanic Conundrum
Many Catholic schools are experiencing declining enrollment. What is surprising is that so many of them are ignoring the potential contained within the growing Hispanic population. There are numerous reasons why a school ignores the Hispanic community within its attendance area. They believe Hispanic parishioners can’t afford the tuition; they don’t speak English well; they need too much remedial assistance; they won’t fit in with the culture of the school, etc. While some of these excuses are valid, that is not usually the case. The main reasons for ignoring the nearby Hispanic community are misinformation and fear.
Let’s look at misinformation. Most people understand that as a group, Hispanics are predominately Catholic. Specifically, the 2010 General Social Survey (GSS) estimated that while 22 percent of non-Hispanic white adults self-identify as Catholic, 63 percent of Hispanics identify themselves as Catholic.
Not only are Hispanics Catholic, but more and more, Catholics are Hispanic! The Pew Research Center’s study, “America’s Changing Religious Landscape” (2015), noted that 34 percent of Catholics are Hispanic and they are younger than non-Hispanics. Pew compares Baby Boomers, who are 67 percent non-Hispanic white and 26 percent Hispanic to Millennials, who are 43 percent non-Hispanic white and 46 percent Hispanic.
Second, the language issue is rapidly dissolving. Pew’s 2014 report, “The Shifting Religious Identity of Latinos in the United States,” reveals that while 59 percent of immigrant Hispanics prefer attending a Spanish-language Mass, only 10 percent of
Hispanics born in the U.S. share that preference. That becomes significant when another 2014 Pew report, “Hispanic Nativity Shift,” identified a 2012 statistic that 64 percent of the total Hispanic population was born in the United States. Since 2000, Pew notes, natural childbirth contributed more to Hispanic population increases than immigration.
Just like when other ethnic groups arrived in the U.S. as immigrants, the parents hold onto their former customs and language while the children quickly assimilate. Current research all points to a day in the near future when children will have Hispanic surnames but will consider themselves American in most ways. If Catholic schools don’t attract these children of the immigrant generation, we will lose an opportunity to connect with this culture for generations to come. If Hispanics become comfortable in the public school system, it will be difficult to convince the children of the second generation to consider Catholic education. That day may be far from today, but the seeds are planted now.
A third concern is that Hispanics by and large cannot afford to pay tuition at a Catholic school. That is probably accurate today, but it also ignores the long term. According to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University (CARA) 1964 research blog Do Catholic Schools Matter, if controls for
income, age, education and other factors are applied, there is no difference between Hispanics and any other race or ethnicity regarding a desire for a Catholic education. That is, the main hesitation for Hispanics today IS affordability, but that is almost certain to change as the second and third generations secure higher paying jobs. Again, if those children of today’s immigrants are not a
part of the Catholic school culture, it is less likely that they will send their future children to Catholic schools, even though they will be able to afford it.
Because many of today’s Hispanics cannot afford Catholic school tuition, we must find ways to help them. Our Advancement departments might need to address the issue directly with the school’s donors as a social justice issue. Our dioceses might need to provide specific financial assistance to Hispanic families. More radically, schools with consistently under-enrolled classrooms could consider providing
discounts for Hispanic families, similar to the program in the Diocese of Allentown. Empty classroom seats could be offered to Hispanic families for a fraction of the prevailing tuition. In classic win-win style, the classroom is more robust, the intellectual diversity is increased, finances improve by receiving at least some income for empty seats, and the lower-income, Catholic Hispanic child receives a Catholic education from which the whole family benefits.
The next reason for ignoring the Hispanic community is fear. How will the addition of Hispanics affect the school’s current culture? Will the school increase its Hispanic enrollment only to see non-Hispanic enrollments decline? How will the teachers adjust to a new culture? These concerns are harder to allay than misinformation because they are emotional and cannot be argued away with logic
and statistics. The problem is that fears sometimes come true and ignoring another’s fear only creates opposition.
Alleviating fear can be accomplished with careful planning, open communication and support from the pulpit and chancery. Respect the concerns. Discuss them. Allow people to plan for the worst, as long as they are open to a smoother road than they envision. Invoke our Catholic mandate to serve those in need. Enlist the help of the school’s local clergy and religious to provide credibility and confidence. Acknowledge the reality that we don’t know exactly what will happen when we try something new, but that the institution and its traditions will be protected and doing nothing is not an option.
Fear freezes people into inaction. We have to overcome that fear and create an environment that is safe and comfortable for all yet allows the institution to evolve and stay relevant.
In twenty or thirty years, Catholic administrators and teachers will look back at this pivotal time when the first generation of Hispanic immigrants made decisions that affected their children and grandchildren. Either those Catholic educators will applaud the foresight and courage of their early 21st century predecessors, or they will wonder. “What were they thinking?” as a whole culture of devout Catholics was shut out of the Catholic educational system.
Celebrating Catholic Education
Having celebrated Catholic Schools Week nearly 6 months ago, I was reflecting on our gathering of Catholic school teachers, leaders, staff, pastors, supporters and friends at the 2019 National Catholic Educational Association conference in Chicago. I can’t help but feel proud of the wonderful contributions our schools make to our Church and the local communities in which they serve. I am also proud of the deep commitment of all who administrate, teach, and work in our schools, put children first, and strive to engage parents, families, parish, and local communities in the lives of their children. It is their dedication and expertise that brings the value of Catholic schools to light.
The greatest value of our schools is the faith dimension of a Catholic school education. As part of the educational and evangelizing life of parishes and the Church, a Catholic school enables students to learn about God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – live out their faith sacramentally in service, and discover who they are within the wider Catholic community in which they live. In this way, the school fully participates in its mission “to teach as Jesus did.”
We are all aware of the additional value our Catholic schools bring to students, their families, and the world in which they live and learn:
- a high-quality academic experience where students can succeed now and in their future
- an opportunity to grow and learn five days a week in a Spirit-filled environment that allows our school communities to stand tall
- engaging parents and families in the spiritual and academic life and education of their children
- an atmosphere of welcoming, caring, challenge, diversity, respect, and integrity with a genuine sense of vision and purpose
- appreciation for, and living out of, the moral teachings of the Church each day to elicit an entirely different “peer pressure” within the school community
- the advantage of growing with other students and families who share strong Catholic/Christian values
- experience a sense of belonging and an identity within the Catholic/Christian community— a genuine sense of worth and esteem
- integrate a sense of social justice by developing an attitude of responsibility to those less fortunate through Christian service
This is what our Catholic schools are about and why we need to celebrate who we are every day of the year.
