CATHOLIC SCHOOLS/ Philadelphia: "A Challenging Day For All of Us"

Here in Philadelphia, a very sad, dark, painful day... then again, such is the Paschal mystery that life will come of it.

According to reports in the field, at this morning's (January 6) closed meeting of pastors and administrators, the Blue Ribbon Commission on Catholic education announced its recommendation to close or merge four high schools and 44 elementary schools -- by far, the most sweeping consolidation of a diocesan schools system ever to take place in the American church.

With 68,000 students today -- the same level it had in 1911 -- the Philadelphia system is currently at less than a quarter of its peak enrollment of the 1950s and '60s. As enrollment's fallen by a third over the last decade, costs have spiked at least 25 percent.

The names of the impacted schools and the commission's report will be publicly released at a 4pm news conference, which will be streamed on the archdiocesan website. After years of piecemeal closings, the Blue Ribbon plan -- over a year in the making -- is intended to create a stable, sustainable framework of Catholic education in the 1.2 million-member church for the next decade.

More to come... in the meanwhile, a letter released this morning from Archbishop Charles Chaput OFM Cap. to the stakeholders of Catholic education in the Philadelphia church includes the following passages:

“Today is a challenging day for all of us with news of the plan to restructure our schools. This plan requires many of our schools throughout the diocese to partner, regionalize or close in order to fortify and renew Catholic education in our Archdiocese. Please be sure of my understanding and support in what may come as difficult news for your family. I'm very grateful for your commitment to Catholic education, especially as we plan for the future.

As you probably know, important trends are impacting Catholic education in the Archdiocese -- declining baptisms, an increase of charter schools, and the rising cost of education. These factors have led to declining enrollment, resulting in higher tuition costs for fewer families and parishes bearing the financial burden of heavy operating deficits. Decreased enrollment has also forced a reduction of full-time personnel in some parish elementary schools to staff programs such as art, music, library, world languages, honors math, physical education, technology and resource rooms....”