Two Catholic elementary schools in the Diocese of Trenton will close their doors this June and a third will need to raise significant funds by January in order to avoid closing, according to recent announcements issued by the schools' pastors.

 In letters to their communities sent in late November, Father Michael Sullivan, pastor of St. Mary of the Lake Parish, Lakewood, which sponsors Holy Family School, and Father Edward Blanchett, pastor of St. Denis Parish and School, Manasquan, each cited financial difficulties resulting from declining enrollment as the primary reasons for the school closure decisions.

 Those same challenges were reported in a letter to the community of St. Paul School, Burlington, by Father Michael Dunn, pastor of St. Katharine Drexel Parish, which sponsors the school, and William Robbins, principal. The letter introduced a fundraising campaign that would aim to meet the "critical and immediate" need of $250,000 that would enable the school to keep its doors open in September. Such fundraising, however, is focused on next year only.

 The decisions were made locally by pastors in concert with parish finance councils and school leadership following a period of assessment and discernment that began with a School Sustainability Study. Commissioned early in 2012 by Bishop David M. O'Connell, C.M., the study was led by national school planning experts and sought to identify the essential benchmarks of healthy schools and measure the capability of Catholic elementary schools across the Diocese to meet those standards.  The results of this study were communicated to pastors and principals last year, and they were asked to make parishes, especially parents, aware of the situation.

 A number of schools found to be "at risk" due to struggles with enrollment and financial viability were set on a course in the fall of 2013 to address the challenges under the guidance and support of the Diocese's Department of Catholic Schools. Consultation and training in the areas of school leadership, strategic planning, finance, and marketing and advancement were provided by diocesan school officials.

 To allow time for the schools facing the most difficult challenges to implement recommendations for development, Bishop O'Connell set aside a grace period, both in 2013 and 2014, ordering that no additional schools would close in the Diocese before June 2015. Providing this extra time required that the Diocese subsidize some of the schools who were left without adequate resources to meet their budgets.

 Anthony J. Mingarino, diocesan chancellor and chief administrative officer, reported that $600,000 was paid out last fiscal year to assist schools in need, and another $1.6 million is projected to be paid by the end of the current school year to allow some of the schools to keep their doors open. These figures do not include additional expenditures by the Diocese to cover insurance premiums for the schools, which is estimated at several million dollars.

Bishop O’Connell and a team of diocesan officials met with the pastors and principals of the challenged schools during this time period, and Bishop O’Connell personally visited and toured each of the schools. That effort was followed up early in the current school year, when the Bishop and diocesan officials again met with the pastors and principals of the challenged schools, again visiting several campuses.

The decision to close or remain open rested with the local pastors and finance councils based on their ability to keep their schools running without draining parish reserves or requiring further subsidy from the Diocese. The consultation focused on the need for long-term viability and sustainability and not simply facing critical issues year by year.

JoAnn Tier, diocesan moderator of Catholic education and superintendent of schools, acknowledged that the closing of schools is a painful and difficult experience, but that the process of assessing the realities that schools face is an important one.  She stated, “We know what a healthy school looks like – it has an enrollment of 220 students; it can operate with a subsidy that doesn’t financially cripple its sponsoring parish, and the difference between the tuition charged and the cost to educate a student is reasonable and manageable.”

She continued, “We still have schools that are working to reach these goals, but we can see that they are stable or making progress. Unfortunately, our schools have been forced to contend with the negative consequences from a weak economy and demographic shifts, many of which have even impacted public schools.  Despite the best efforts, not every school has been able to successfully turn around the downward trends.

“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the members of those school communities where closures have been announced. We will be working to assist those families with placement in other Catholic schools, but no one can deny that there will always be a sense of loss.”

There are currently 43 parish and diocesan Catholic schools in the Diocese of Trenton, educating nearly 17,000 students from pre-kindergarten through high school.