Parish Schools

Thanks to a $25,000 contribution from the Notre Dame Alumni Club of Philadelphia, three classrooms at St. Malachy Elementary School in North Philadelphia have interactive whiteboards. The school used part of a $5,000 gift from Lockheed Martin Corp. to buy a dozen microscopes. Parishoners from Queen of Peace in Ardsley supplied the school's new basketball uniforms. And a $25,000 grant from the Anna-Maria Moggio Foundation in Center City is underwriting a new music program. While many inner-city Catholic parish schools are on the brink of financial disaster, St. Malachy is strong, vibrant and fiscally stable.

With the arrival last week of Archbishop Anthony J. Bevilacqua, some Catholic lay teachers have begun wondering whether the change in church leadership will result in a softening of the hard-line stance the archdiocese has taken toward collective bargaining efforts among parish teachers. "I hope for the sake of the lay teachers that he will give them the right to unionize, if they so wish, and have a systemwide election," said Larry Legner, who spent 15 years teaching in parish schools and was active in organizing efforts before he left two years ago to take a better-paying job at a Catholic high school.

A committee of Catholic priests and lay people in North Philadelphia has recommended consolidation of six parish elementary schools into three, with St. Bonaventure, St. Edward and St. Henry schools to be closed beginning next fall. The proposal - just a small piece of the pending reorganization of church operations in North Philadelphia - goes next to Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, who will have the final say on which schools stay open and which are closed. "The overall purpose is to preserve and protect the existence of Catholic education in some of our more stressed areas," said Msgr.

During yesterday's 11 a.m. Mass, the Rev. Victor J. Eschbach, pastor of Most Precious Blood of Our Lord, looked out at the predominantly black congregation that filled the old wooden pews of his North Philadelphia church. "As just about all of you know, we will be closing our school at the end of this academic year," he announced sadly before reading aloud a letter from Cardinal John Krol granting permission to close the parish school that has served the Strawberry Mansion section for more than 60 years.

Now that the 13-block march from St. Peter the Apostle Church to the Gesu Church has ended, now that the Mass commemorating 130 years of black people attending Catholic schools has been celebrated, the hard part starts. How can the 40,000 black Catholics in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia continue the tradition of Catholic elementary schools in their communities? How can they buck a nationwide trend that has seen Catholic urban schools close while the number of black children attending those schools has increased significantly in the last decade?

Jeff Hewitt of Kensington said his son has attended two Catholic schools in the past three years because of closures - and now he'll have to find him a third. His son's school, St. Anne's, on Tucker Street near Memphis, is one of seven archdiocesan schools that will close at the end of the academic year, the Office of Catholic Education said yesterday. "What am I paying for?" Hewitt asked angrily, holding a letter to parents from the St. Anne Alumni Association. "The alumni want us to be patient.

A sharp drop in enrollment at a Catholic elementary school in Bridesburg has prompted Cardinal Justin Rigali to approve a temporary plan for sending its students to a neighboring parochial school this fall. In March, Rigali had given the parish councils of All Saints and St. John Cantius permission to consider possibly merging at the end of the 2004-2005 school year because of declining enrollment and rising costs. But an unexpected drop in enrollment at All Saints now has prompted church officials to act before September.

Amy McLeod, Villanova University Class of 1993, will spend her first year on her own sleeping in a recently abandoned convent, working in Mount Airy and making next to nothing. "I think it's going to be great," she said. Christine Tomasik agrees. So does Vince O'Donohue. Ditto Kellie Mooney. The four are part of a group of eight women and three men taking part in a pioneering effort in the Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia. In exchange for room and board, a small monthly stipend, and medical benefits, the 11 will spend at least one year teaching elementary or middle-school students in local Catholic schools.

The news came as no real surprise, but teachers and students were left saddened just the same yesterday by the announcement by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia that two parish schools, St. Michael in North Philadelphia and Our Lady of Loreto in Southwest Philadelphia, will close at the end of the school year. Empty seats are the reason. Enrollment at St. Michael's this year is at 122, though the school could accommodate 230, while at Our Lady of Loreto, 145 students attend classes, with 115 empty desks, the archdiocese says.

Declining enrollment will cause two more Roman Catholic elementary schools to close next month, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced yesterday. Parishioners at St. Bartholomew in the city's Lower Northeast and at Holy Trinity in Bridgeport, Montgomery County, learned during weekend Masses that their schools would close. The two parish schools join three other Catholic elementary schools that are set to close outright next month. Seven others are slated to consolidate into three regional schools.

The bishop of the Trenton Diocese says he will not reconsider his decision this month to shutter the 150-year-old St. Mary School in Bordentown. But the school's supporters are mobilizing and won't rule out the possibility of an appeal to keep it open. "If we have enough of a groundswell . . . from the community, we're willing to move forward," said David Burden, who heads the Save St. Mary Committee, a coalition of parents, teachers, alumni, and others. He wants supporters to petition the diocese for a reversal of the bishop's decision.

St. Hubert Catholic High School for Girls in Holmesburg marked the one-year anniversary of its rescue from closing last week with a march, rally, and Mass of Thanksgiving. Monsignor Bonner-Archbishop Prendergast Catholic High School in Drexel Hill celebrated with pretzels, a dress-down day, and played pop songs when class periods changed. But in the 12 months since Archbishop Charles J. Chaput announced a plan to restructure Catholic education in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia that spared four high schools from closing, the most dramatic changes were less visible.

AS CATHOLIC schools in our region mark National Catholic Schools Week, we have an opportunity to celebrate the importance of Catholic education in the lives of families across the Delaware Valley. But while many may think that this week is one marked by the Catholic community alone, it is important to note the ever-growing role that Catholic schools play in the lives of many non-Catholic families, who also will celebrate Catholic education this week for the excellent opportunity it has provided their children.

Janet Dollard was a few months into her first year as president of Conwell-Egan High School in Fairless Hills when the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced in January it planned to close the school as part of a broad restructuring of Catholic education. Ultimately, Conwell-Egan and three other endangered high schools were saved, a foundation was established to manage them, and Dollard's school now has one of its largest freshman classes in years. "It was a whirlwind, really," Dollard recalled in a recent interview.

By Bryan Carter Earlier this year, a Philadelphia Archdiocese blue-ribbon commission made recommendations for strengthening the region's Catholic schools. They included major consolidations, some closings, and the conversion of more than a dozen former parish schools in underserved areas into "mission schools. " While much of the plan was implemented swiftly, the slated mission schools have not yet fully adopted their new model - for good reasons. For many students, parents, and educators, mission schools are an unfamiliar idea.

Helping teachers after closings The mergers and closures resulting from the Blue Ribbon Commission recommendations this January were challenging for teachers, administrators, and school families throughout the archdiocese. The Office of Catholic Education (OCE) recognizes the sacrifices that so many, including teachers, make in support of Catholic education. We have a responsibility to respect that sacrifice and a duty to help them. Since the announcement, efforts have been ongoing to assist all those affected — students, parents, teachers, and staff.

It was an uncertain Father's Day for many dads and moms of St. Bridget's parish in East Falls as they awaited news on the fate of a regional Catholic elementary school that never was — and might never be. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia is expected to announce Monday whether it will create a new regional elementary school in Manayunk that would include the youngsters of St. Bridget's parish school, which closed its doors forever Friday....

A new regional Catholic elementary school that had been proposed for Manayunk will not open in September due to low enrollment, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced Monday. St. Blaise Regional School was going to be created through the merger of St. Bridget parish school in East Falls and Holy Child Regional School in Manayunk, and based at Holy Child. But only 155 students had registered as of Friday, and the archdiocese said the school needed to have at least 250 students to cover teacher salaries and provide a quality education.

"DESPITE. " Of all the words in the totally depressing "important communique" from St. Blaise Regional Catholic School, that one word — "despite" — underscores why so many parents have rejected St. Blaise as the educational choice for their kids. Posted on the school's website on Friday, the letter, penned by East Falls and Manayunk parish priests, laments that just 155 students have registered for the 2012-13 academic year at St. Blaise. That's 95 fewer kids than the 250 needed to pay for teachers' salaries and programs come September.

With just five baptisms, one wedding and 373 worshipers at weekly Mass in 2010, the ecclesiastical writing was on the wall for Holy Trinity Church, which has served Polish parishioners in Phoenixville since 1903. On Sunday, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced that Holy Trinity would merge with the only slightly busier St. Mary of the Assumption across the street and founded in 1840. Two other Phoenixville churches, Sacred Heart, a Slovak church established in 1903, and St. Ann, which dates to 1905, will come together at St. Ann. In a news release on the closings, the Archdiocese said the "revitalized parishes" will be "better equipped to meet the spiritual and pastoral needs of future generations.