Bishop Anthony B. Taylor
Our gathering today is bittersweet. Sweet because we have come to congratulate you graduates and offer you our prayers and best wishes as you prepare for the next stage of your life. We are proud of you and we know that your years here at St. Joseph have prepared you well for the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. But also bitter because there is a twinge of sorrow in saying goodbye as you leave us to begin a new (and in a lot of ways still uncertain) chapter in your life.
When I first began to work on this commencement address, I thought I was going to have to speak with you about the closing of your school and that you would be the last graduating class. In these remarks I was going to tell you that I understand what closing a school entails because I attended a Catholic high school that closed at the end of my 11th grade year. We didn’t see it coming, and indeed we had just bought our high school rings. So I have a ring for a graduating class that did not exist. By 1971 there were only 72 students in our high school in Ponca City, Okla., a town in northern Oklahoma about half the size of Pine Bluff. So I ended up graduating from the local public high school.
Now I see that that there is one way in which St. Joseph Junior/Senior High School is different from my school, and that is how hard you have worked to keep this school open. If our parents had worked half as hard as you have, I think my high school might still be open today. We had some advantages you don’t have. We had 72 students spread across four years — there would have been nine in my graduating class, but the other three grades averaged 21 students each; while here we don’t even have 60 students spread across six grades — an average of 10 students per grade. And yet as far as I can tell, our parents just rolled over and played dead. But to your credit, you did not — even in the face of very discouraging conditions. You have sought donors relentlessly, you have worked hard to retain students and recruit new students; you have racked your brains trying to come up with the curriculum and staffing changes necessary to produce a balanced budget.
And your efforts highlight three very important insights to which I would like to draw your attention — and especially our graduating seniors — as we look to the future. These insights are summarized beautifully in the famous “Serenity Prayer” as follows: “Lord, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
1) Serenity is that inner peace that comes from accepting humbly our own limitations and –charitably — the limitations of others. When faced with death, be it our own death or the death of a loved one or the possible death of a beloved school, we go through predictable stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, blaming and withdrawing — and we have experienced some of these things — and then finally acceptance of those things that are simply out of our control.
2) Courage is the willingness to leave our own comfort zone and strive sacrificially — with all our heart — to accomplish all the good we can, not giving up too readily in the face of apparently overwhelming challenges and obstacles. And I must say, your struggle to keep this school open has been courageous and has given our graduating seniors a powerful example of what it takes to live for something bigger than yourself.
3) Wisdom. At a certain point we have to step back and get perspective on the situation we are facing and discern whether even our best efforts have any real prospect of success. Whether the time has come to accept our own limitations and the futility of further effort, or whether there is in fact still hope and perhaps just a new approach is needed. And that is our situation here today.
So now I would like to speak with you about the future of your school. You may recall that a few months ago I established the following benchmarks that your school needed to meet in order for your school to stay open: 1) to have 60 students pre-enrolled for the 2012-13 school year, 2) to raise $200,000 in cash and pledges, and 3) to produce a balanced budget based on realistic figures. Although you have not yet met these requirements, you have made significant progress and a balanced budget has been submitted to the Office of Catholic Schools. After reviewing this information with the superintendent, Mrs. Vernell Bowen, I have decided that you are close enough to the enrollment and fundraising benchmarks to permit me to give your school a “Year of Grace” to reorganize and develop a workable strategic plan for the future providing the enrollment does not decrease, the pledges are honored and the budget remains balanced. I also give permission to begin registration for fifth and sixth-grade students for the next school year. The Office of Catholic Schools has assessed the feasibility and there is classroom space to accommodate these students.
It will not be, however, business as usual next year because it is obvious to me that very significant changes are needed for St. Joseph School’s long-term survival. To that end I have decided that during this “year of grace” the following steps are to be taken immediately:
1. The Office of Catholic Schools has been directed to oversee directly the operations of the school including staffing, reorganizing the school board, oversight of the finances and providing support for the development of a strategic plan.
2. All staff will reapply for their positions and will be interviewed by the Office of Catholic Schools, which will decide who is to be hired for the coming school year. It is my presumption that most current employees will be rehired, but the staffing configuration will of necessity be different next year and the Office of Catholic Schools needs a free hand to do what will be best for the school going forward. Vernell will be available to discuss this further with current staff and faculty in a closed-door meeting with just them present following the conclusion of the reception following this graduation ceremony.
3. The current school board is likewise dissolved and a new school board will be appointed by the Office of Catholic Schools in consultation with the pastor of St. Joseph Parish.
I would like to thank all the people who have been so dedicated in supporting the efforts to raise money to meet the financial challenges of this school. It is because of you that we are able to continue to provide Catholic education in Pine Bluff next year and are given an opportunity to plan strategically for the future. I am grateful to the staff, the parishioners of St. Joseph, the pastor, and the donors. A special thanks to Mrs. Sandra Taylor for her willingness to step forward and lead the “Save St. Joseph Campaign”.
Graduating seniors, these (so far successful) efforts to save your school give you a very concrete example of how prayer coupled with faith-filled action has the power to solve problems and surmount obstacles too big for us to overcome on our own. And since there are plenty of more problems to solve and obstacles to face as you begin the next chapter of your life, I recommend that you pray this “Serenity Prayer” every morning as you get out of bed and prepare to face the challenges of the day. You have learned about serenity, courage and wisdom throughout your years here at St. Joseph and now have seen in a very concrete way (in the efforts of so many to save your school) how important these virtues are for facing the difficult things of life. And that is my prayer for all of us today and for the future — that God grant us “the serenity to accept the things we cannot change, the courage to change the things we can and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Bishop Anthony B. Taylor delivered this graduation speech May 10 at St. Joseph Church in Pine Bluff.
