Much has changed in the 170 years that Catholic education has been provided in Arkansas.
Gone are the days when nuns taught a handful of students in a small, drafty schoolhouse next to the church. Now few religious teach in the schools as the overall cost of education has risen with teacher salaries, mandated academic standards, technology and facility maintenance.
Vernell Bowen, superintendent of schools for the Diocese of Little Rock, said in today’s world, it is more important than ever for Catholic school administrators and school boards to be good financial managers. Strong marketing and strategic planning also are keys to success.
Despite three recent closures and one consolidation, Bowen said, overall the Catholic school system in Arkansas is stable and viable.
Effects of change
In 2005, Holy Redeemer School in El Dorado closed, followed by Our Lady of Good Counsel School in Little Rock in 2006, and Immaculate Conception School in Blytheville in 2007. Also, two North Little Rock schools, St. Patrick and St. Mary, consolidated this fall into North Little Rock Catholic Academy.
“We probably still have some schools that are fragile and it has to do with finances, which is attributed to enrollment,” Bowen said.
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Most of those schools, however, are developing plans to adapt to dips in enrollment as well as how to market their schools with the help of local professionals working with their school boards, she said.
Similar to El Dorado and Blytheville, schools considered fragile are in areas where “there have been demographic shifts; people moving out of smaller cities into larger cities, or there are just no jobs available to bring people to those cities,” Bowen said.
Two examples include Holy Rosary School in Stuttgart and St. Mary School in Lake Village, which are located in the economically depressed Delta region. In both cases, the schools’ enrollments have been unstable.
“I really think that all the schools that are open right now, if plans can be developed to address where they are financially, and how to raise the money for them, then I think they can stay open,” she said.
Of the schools that closed or consolidated in the Little Rock area, Bowen said that while increased tuition and additional private school options may have been factors, demographic shifts was still the main reason.
Movement out of the inner-city areas to western and northern Pulaski County negatively affected Our Lady of Good Counsel, St. Patrick and St. Mary schools.
A national transition
Beyond Arkansas, major demographic shifts seem to be the reason for recent Catholic school closures and consolidations across the nation.
According to “Primary Trends, Challenges and Outlook: A Report on U.S. Catholic Elementary Schools, 2000-2005,” a study commission by the National Catholic Education Association, “Recent school closures are part of a long-term realignment process affecting the Catholic elementary school system that quickened between 2000 and 2005.”
In the 2006 study, which was conducted by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate, a Georgetown University affiliated research center, NCEA president Karen Ristau, said, “Demographic shifts — ’people moved and the schools didn’t’ — have proven to be the most critical reason for enrollment losses and school closures.”
According to the study, the number of Catholic elementary schools in the United States declined by 339 to a total of 6,574 between the 2000-2001 and the 2004-2005 school years, a 5-percent drop.
Most of the overall loses took place in the Midwest and Northeast, but in other areas, demographic changes led to a demand for Catholic schools where too few were available, leading to waiting lists in the South and West as well as New England, the study indicated.
“Rather than any national decline in demand for Catholic elementary schooling, the net loss of schools during this six-year period occurred in part because too few new campuses were established in areas that have waiting lists.”
Overall the study found that nationally about three in 10 Catholic elementary schools had waiting lists during 2004-2005.
Keeping up with growth
Of the 31 Catholic schools in Arkansas, only five are located south of Little Rock. Another four are in northeast Arkansas, while the majority follow a line from Little Rock moving northwest to Fort Smith and then north up to Rogers.
Like the national trend, Bowen said demographic shifts to western Pulaski County have led to waiting lists for certain grade levels at Christ the King School in Little Rock.
She said the risk with this scenario is parents take their kids to other private schools and may not return to the Catholic school when openings become available.
Christ the King School is currently developing its strategic plan for the next three to five years. As part of that study, the school is looking at adding classroom space to accommodate the need, Bowen said.
The NCEA assisted the diocese in developing an overall strategic plan for all Pulaski County Catholic schools in 2006. In that study, demographic shifts also showed a need near Cabot and Jacksonville, she said.
The plan called for Catholic parents at St. Jude Church to be surveyed to investigate the possibility of building a school there.
In northwest Arkansas, where the population continues to increase, St. Raphael School opened this fall in Springdale. It serves preschool age 3 to third grade, with plans to add a grade each year up to eighth grade. In Rogers, St. Vincent de Paul School plans to add grade eight to its program next fall. Meanwhile, Bowen said the diocese recently completed a second feasibility study on a possible Catholic high school in the region.
The study was conducted by Meitler Consultants of Hales Corners, Wis., the same group who did the original study in 2003. Bowen said she received the report Nov. 9, but had not yet had time to study the results. However, as expected, she said there had been considerable growth since the last study.
“That’s an area where it’s growing rapidly and as population shifts then you have to look at where the needs are,” Bowen said.
Sister Dale McDonald, PBVM, director of public policy and educational research at NCEA, said opening new schools is much more difficult than it used to be. In the past, the school was built next to the church with a lot of donated labor and materials.
Today with the high cost of land and construction coupled with the required impact studies and building codes, building a school is very expensive, she said.
Bowen said because of the high financial risk, feasibility studies are crucial. Also, no parish or school building project in the diocese can begin without adhering to diocesan guidelines and approval from the Building Commission.
Being creative and financially sound
For those schools that have been negatively affected by demographic shifts, Bowen said, smart management, creativity and long-range planning can guide them through the lean times.
“If you have been evaluating your financials, and you look at your enrollment trends on a regular basis, when you have a dip in enrollment, you are better able to adjust,” Bowen said.
Any time a school’s enrollment falls below 100, it causes a real financial strain. At St. Paul School in Pocahontas, enrollment fell to 92 students in 2002. To offset the operating expenses, the school was able to only use the interest off its endowment until the enrollment recovered. This fall the enrollment was back up to 117.
St. Paul and other schools like Holy Rosary in Stuttgart, St. Mary in Lake Village and Our Lady of Fatima School in Benton are making it work without sacrificing high academic standards, Bowen said.
In some cases, classes are joined to cut costs, but the standardized test scores show this has not negatively affected the students, she said.
The support of parents and parish leadership also is a major factor in a school’s viability, even if it has a small enrollment, Bowen said.
St. Mary School in Paragould is a good example: “The parish wants this school to survive,” she said. In addition to the parish subsidy, both school parents and parishioners support the school’s fundraisers.
Bowen said the goal for a school is to effectively operate with the least amount of financial support from the parish.
The 2006 strategic plan for Pulaski County schools showed that on average parishes subsidized about 8 percent of the schools’ operating budgets. The same study showed the national average for parish subsidy was 22 percent.
“I tell principals and boards this, that the school is a ministry of the parish,” Bowen said. “So a school can’t cause a parish to cut out all their other ministries or cause a parish to go bankrupt.”
For those parishes that have already closed their schools, there is still hope, Bowen said. They just need to find different ways to serve their community’s educational needs.
At Our Lady of Good Counsel, she said a parish committee is studying possibilities for the school that closed there last year.
“It may not be the same kind of educational facility you’ve had in the past,” Bowen said. Rather the issue becomes “what do you want to do as an outreach mission for your parish?”
Choosing Catholic education
Catholic school enrollment in Arkansas peaked at nearly 11,500 students in the mid-1960s, which is consistent with the national trend.
Sister Dale said national Catholic school enrollment topped out at 5.6 million in 1965. Today, the enrollment is about half that with 2.3 million.
Ironically, more schools closed during the 1960s than during any other time in the diocese’s history. From 1960 to 1969, 25 schools closed. The fewest closures — two — happened in the 1990s.
Sister Dale said nationally the highest number of school closures occurred from the mid-1960s to early 1980s.
Many factors may have contributed to this, but Bowen said the U.S. bishops’ mandate in the late 1800s that all parishes have Catholic schools played a significant role.
“As our society became closer because of transportation, there wasn’t a need for all those schools,” Bowen said. “It also became more costly to operate those small schools as the sisters left.”
Until the Second Vatican Council, Catholic children went to Catholic schools. Now, “we’ve shifted from when people were told they had to go to Catholic schools” to a time when parents have choices in educating their children, Ristau said.
In addition, the 2006 CARA study found that since Vatican II, “church attendance is down significantly,” Sister Dale said.
The study showed that nationally only 20 percent of Catholic parents with school-age children attend church in a regular basis.
“The family is not as related to church as it used to be and therefore the relation to the school is not what it had been,” she said.
With all the choices parents can make now, Ristau said, “we have to let people know what a good choice Catholic education is.”
She said the CARA study confirmed what NCEA officials long suspected: Parents that send their children to Catholic schools do so primarily for the religious education. “Religion is woven throughout the day for the children’s experience.”
Planning for the future
The constant need to reevaluate the mission and see how that aligns with the needs of the community is why all Catholic schools should have a three-to-five-year strategic plan, Bowen said.
Currently, NCEA is assisting St. John School in Hot Springs with a strategic plan that should be completed by the end of the school year, she said.
“Good strategic planning is absolutely essential,” Ristau said, “so you know where you’re going, you know where children are, you know what resources you have. It’s like good, smart business sense and that helps the school stay viable.”
As for the future of Catholic schools, Ristau said she believes it is very strong. “There’s still a big need for Catholic schools. People want Catholic schools.”
The following qualities indicate Catholic school viability.
Catholic spirit
A viable parish/school relationship — Religious formation opportunities for students and staff and active participation in parish life
Pastor/parishioner support — Consensus of school board, pastor and others that the school is a mission of the parish
Strong Catholic identity — Daily prayer, instruction, service, all integrated into the curriculum, plus faculty formation with student and parent participation in liturgies
Excellence in education
Student performance verifies an excellent academic program
School is fully accredited
School has qualified and competent faculty and administration
Parent involvement
Financial viability
Stable enrollment trends (assessment of growth or loss over five-year period). A downward spiral over five years is a good indication of lack of viability.
Stable parish and community demographics
Balanced budget and a three-year projected budget
Tuition fees relative to actual cost of educating a student
Three- to five-year plan that includes finances, programs, facilities, marketing and development
Warnings of an unstable school
These red flags indicate immediate problems with the viability of a school.
Downward spiral of enrollment over a three- to five-year period
Lack of a budget
Lack of report to school board and parish finance council regarding school finances
Use of the principal from the school’s endowment for operational expenses
Lack of long-range planning
Inability to pay monthly bills
Use of collection of income from registration for next school year to complete current school year
Per pupil ratio of less than 20:1 at each grade level or school not operating at capacity enrollment
Inability to hire qualified staff
Source: Catholic Schools Office for the Diocese of Little Rock
