Campaign to ensure availability of Catholic education, formation

Numbers tell part of the story.

Educators and parish pastors, who have watched parents stretch limited resources to provide a Catholic school education for their children, see more.

As do a growing number of parents seeking placement for their children in limited spaces available in Catholic schools.

To ensure Catholic education and nurture faith among the broadest group of children possible, the Diocese of Sacramento has made Catholic education and formation the largest piece of its $50 million capital campaign. “Preserving Our Past, Building Our Future,” has designated $16 million to address the needs of Catholic education and formation.

A major portion of these funds will create an endowment of $5 million for elementary and secondary need-based scholarships to families with children attending diocesan, parish and private Catholic schools.

“Our tuitions are increasing every year, our cost of educating a child is increasing every year, and more and more people are finding it a challenge to meet those increases,” according to Tom Butler, superintendent of Catholic schools for the diocese. “The good news is this campaign is going to help an awful lot of people who otherwise would not be able to receive a Catholic education.”

Currently the bishop’s scholarship fund provides support based on financial need from a pool of approximately 4,000 students at seven Catholic high schools in the diocese. Two qualifiers for these funds, which in 2000 provided $483,800 to 284 families with high school students, are that the student is Roman Catholic and there is evidence of financial need.

Butler said that support from the capital campaign will effectively double the bishop’s fund for tuition, supporting a much broader range of students. Not only will it fund more high school tuitions, which are now reaching $7,000 annually, but will provide much needed assistance to 12,000 elementary school students throughout the diocese.

“If you have three times the number of elementary students, three times more elementary than secondary students will probably get scholarships,” Butler said.

Tuition charges at elementary schools for the 2001-02 school year ranged from a low of $2,117 for the first child of a parishioner, to a high of $3,930, with a diocesan average of $2,670. The average per pupil cost was $3,418, an increase of 15.4 percent over last year.

Butler said the biggest non-funded gap is middle income people earning above poverty level.

“These are people for whom tuition to a Catholic school is an enormous chunk of their available resources,” he said. “These are the people I think are going to benefit as we begin to build our scholarship fund.”

Also expected to benefit from the scholarship endowment fund are families with two or more children enrolled at elementary and secondary levels. A family with three children, one in high school and two in elementary, might have a tuition cost of about $13,000 a year. Scholarship support at both elementary and secondary levels, Butler said, “makes Catholic education very affordable.”

The campaign has also earmarked approximately $7.5 million for building projects at two diocesan high schools, St. Francis Catholic in Sacramento and Bishop Quinn Catholic in Palo Cedro.

St. Francis will receive $5 million for a long needed expansion project. Marion Bishop, president of St. Francis, said that being included in the diocesan campaign is both “affirming” and very much needed.

“This campus is 35 years old and has never added any physical resources to the building,” she said. “We’re accommodating 830 girls on a school built for 600.”

Bishop said the school has taken a number of steps to provide a short-term solution to space problems including extending the school day. Over 20 classes meet before or after school due to insufficient classroom space.

The phased $20 million expansion project will in phase one add 16 classrooms, including six science labs, a newly located entrance plaza on Elvas Avenue with added parking, and a fine arts and library resource center.

Phase two includes the addition of a gymnasium and dining hall and phase three is the creation of an aquatic center and additional playing fields.

St. Francis has launched its own capital campaign, and like the diocese, is following the fundraising strategies advised by Community Counseling Services, the consulting firm hired to oversee the campaign.

A leadership team is inviting families who are not members of parishes to invest in the future of the school. Nancy Corbett, whose daughter Meaghan is a junior at St. Francis, is a member of that leadership team and president of the parent guild.

“This project is an absolute necessity,” she said. “The job the school does from a parent’s perspective is outstanding. It’s easier to give to a cause when you see every inch and every dime is being used wisely.”

Bishop said the request for pledges has met with a very positive response not only from parents, but also faculty and staff members, who have pledged more than $250,000 to the campaign. Prior to the campaign, St. Francis had placed $5 million in reserve for the expansion project.

“Right now we are sitting very close to our $1 million capital campaign mark,” she said.

Construction on phase one, which is estimated to cost approximately $10.7 million, is expected to begin June 7, and will be ready for students in the fall of 2003.

Bishop Quinn Catholic High School will receive $2.5 million from the diocesan capital campaign for future building and operating needs.

Principal Raymond John said the campus, which includes Bishop Quinn and St. Francis Middle School, built in the mid-1990s, is trying to meet the needs of a growing student body. Approximately 170 students are enrolled at Bishop Quinn this year and 210 are expected next fall.

“At this rate we won’t have a classroom for every period of instruction,” he said.

The campaign funds will provide a new building with nine additional classrooms for the high school, at a cost of approximately $900,000.

A combined campaign fund drive to support the Bishop Quinn project has been organized, including St. Joseph and Our Lady of Mercy Parishes in Redding and Sacred Heart Parish in Anderson.

Msgr. Russell Terra, pastor of St. Joseph Parish, said that raising funds for the high school is “the chance of a lifetime.”

“We all will really benefit,” he said. “St. Joseph pre-school and elementary school students need some place to go, and we need to guarantee their education into perpetuity.”

Father Eric Lofgren, pastor of Sacred Heart in Parish, echoed that sentiment. “We have a great future at Sacred Heart, and our teenagers are a major priority in our community,” he said.

Bishop Quinn’s portion of the capital campaign will also include $500,000 for an endowment fund supporting high school scholarships, with the balance to help pay off previous building and improvement debts.

Construction of the new building is to begin in November and to be completed by the second semester in 2003.

With the goal of developing a master plan to address the establishment of future schools, the diocesan capital campaign also includes $1.5 million to seed a school building fund. A portion of this fund will be used to conduct a survey to determine the total educational needs of the diocese.

The survey will examine “the needs of the current population that are not being met by current elementary schools,” Butler said. “We’re interested in making sure there are enough feeder schools to fill a Catholic high school before we build one.”

As an example Butler pointed to the city of Fairfield, which has two parishes, one Catholic elementary school, and twice as many applications for kindergarten as there is space.

Among the challenges of constructing new schools, he said, is the cost of building, which runs from $25 to $40 million for a fairly basic school accommodating 600 to 800 students. Add to that an annual operating budget of $5 to $8 million, and a parent base that can pay the tuition.

Butler said it’s his hope that the school building fund will enable the diocese to begin purchasing parcels of land in rapidly-growing areas.

The capital campaign has also designated $1 million to increase the diocese’s seminary endowment to assist with the educational costs of men studying for the priesthood.

“Vocations are a huge concern for the church,” said Chad Bortle of Community Counseling Services, the campaign’s executive director. “We decided early on that we had to do more for priests than retirement. We had to address the future of the church in Northern California in regard to vocations.”

The cost to educate each of the 51 young men currently studying for the priesthood for the diocese is approximately $20,000 a year, according to Dominican Sister Maureen McInerney, co-director of vocations. The cost is only increasing, she added.

“In the last seven years, the number of seminarians has tripled. They need assistance with board, room, books and personal expenses,” she said.

The campaign will also help strengthening diocesan faith formation programs by creating a $1 million lay formation endowment.

The endowment will offer partial scholarships for the formation of parish coordinators and directors of religious education, coordinators of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults, youth ministers, religion teachers and other lay ministers.

Bob Meaney, director of the department of Catholic Faith Formation, said among those who would benefit from the endowment are nine coordinators of religious education and two youth ministers currently enrolled in master’s programs.

“These people are working for the church but paying their own tuition,” he said. “Some of these leaders will not only benefit one parish, but as we move into clustering parishes, will assist several parishes.”

A second area Meaney expects the lay formation endowment to benefit is in funding training programs.

“We have a need in the diocese to train our leaders and volunteers in the RCIA adapted for children,” he said.

Copyright © 2001 Diocese of Sacramento - All Rights Reserved

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