Although overall enrollment in Catholic schools in the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois is down a bit this academic year, enrollment is up in some schools, says Jean Johnson, superintendent of Catholic schools. One school in particular, Marquette Catholic High School in Alton, has seen tremendous growth.
"Looking at the track record over the past several school years, we see that in 2009-2010, enrollment in Catholic schools was down 1.8 percent and up 1.3 percent in 2010-2011," said Johnson. "The enrollment for 2011-2012 is down 2.2 percent.
"In looking a little more closely at the numbers, the enrollment at the high schools is up .7 percent while the elementary school numbers are down 2.9 percent," Johnson said. "I'm sure it is the economy that is affecting enrollment.
"I know we are doing as much as we can with the schools, the parishes are doing what they can and I know the parents are working hard, but the economy is hurting us," she said. Of course, over the past few years the schools have been using monies from the Harvest of Thanks education endowment to provide tuition assistance to students, which is helpful.
Johnson admits that looking at the overall picture doesn't actually give an accurate portrayal of what is happening in any specific area. "Some enrollments went up and some went down," she said. "Sometimes the families are simply moving. They have to go where the jobs are."
Paul Rittof, director of marketing and development for Quincy Catholic elementary schools and executive director of the QCES Foundation, reported that the 2011-2012 enrollments for Quincy's four Catholic elementary schools is up slightly from last year's enrollment figures.
This fall, the four elementary schools have an overall enrollment (PreK-8) of 1,006 students, compared to 1,002 last fall. Blessed Sacrament and St. Dominic schools both benefitted from the increase in students.
"Although the economy is still sluggish, the pastors are committed to providing the necessary financial assistance to make a Catholic elementary education an affordable option for any parish family wishing to send their children to a Catholic school, which helps our enrollment efforts," said Rittof.
"The QCES Foundation is also committed to assist pastors in making Catholic elementary education an affordable option for families belonging to one of Quincy's four Catholic parishes," he said. Increased enrollment at the PreK level is an encouraging sign for future enrollment as the overwhelming majority of students enrolled in one of the four QCES pre-school programs go on to enroll in kindergarten at one of the four QCES schools.
"This fall's Pre-K to eighth-grade enrollment includes a number of students, both Catholic and non-Catholic, whose families moved to Quincy over the summer and chose to enroll their children in one of Quincy's Catholic elementary schools," Rittof said.
Marquette experiencing most growth
However, the one school in the Springfield diocese that is truly experiencing outstanding growth is Marquette, Johnson reiterated.
Marquette principal Mike Slaughter reports that enrollment has been steadily increasing over the last four years. "The class of 2011 included 41 kids, which was a very small class, but this year we brought in 121 freshmen," he said. "Every year for the past several years our incoming freshman classes have grown."
Slaughter said the numbers show the trend. "Three years ago we were at 232; two years ago we were at 254; last year we were at 296; this year we have 375 students," he said. "You know what, I appreciate that we are shocking everybody with our growth. I see that as a good thing."
About 80 of Marquette's students come from the North County area in Missouri and the high school provides a bus to take those students back and forth to classes. However, most of the students at Marquette live within 20 miles of the school and all live within a 30-mile radius of Alton.
"It helped when Alton built the new bridge and the roads became easier to travel. More people started to come here. Our tuition is $5,700 and they see that as a good value for a Catholic education. With the economy being as it is, many people in North County have found us to be a very affordable bargain," Slaughter said. "We are 90 percent Catholic, but our school is seen as a good opportunity for both Catholic and non-Catholic students," he said.
"And, yes, we know we are losing some Catholic school kids to the public schools. That's to be expected."
Marquette has a capital campaign under way and Slaughter said he and the school board have made some improvements. "We've kind of had to scramble to find space, but that's a dilemma we welcome. We've done a lot of things to improve the building, the classrooms and the hallways," he said. "This year I had to hire six teachers — that's in addition to the returning staff. We want to maintain the appropriate student to teacher ratio.
"We love that we are growing, but we don't want to get too big," Slaughter concluded. "My school board and I think that we are approaching the optimum amount of kids. We'd like to be at 400. We are still a small school and we want to maintain that small school 'family atmosphere.' That's important to us."