Forty Catholic Schools May Close
About 40 Catholic schools in the Chicago area are at risk of being closed or reconfigured at the end of the school year, the Chicago Tribune said.
The closings is potentially the largest school shakeup in the history of the archdiocese, affecting nearly 17 percent of the nation's largest parochial system.
The schools on the list have all seen declining enrollment and deteriorating finances in recent years.
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Spokesman Jim Dwyer said recommendations could be made to Cardinal Francis George by sometime in January, but there is no firm deadline.
The examination was prompted by population shifts that have left some once-bustling parish schools with dwindling populations.
Once a school dips below 200 students, it often has a harder time staying afloat with tuition receipts and help from the parish church. The archdiocese makes grants to some schools but can't afford to keep every one open, Dwyer said.
"We're not in the position to fund endless grants. We have finite resources, too," Dwyer said.
Schools with diminished enrollments could be consolidated and supported by several parishes. The archdiocese declined to discuss which schools are under scrutiny, but officials confirmed that the list included about 40 schools, including two archdiocesan high schools.
"They are definitely vulnerable. Their future is probably going to change," archdiocese spokeswoman Colleen Dolan said Friday. "It's a terrible number, but the archdiocese has financial responsibilities. We can't fund what we don't have.
"The days of the parish schools, funded by the parishioners, where parish children walked down the street to their school, worked for many years. But it doesn't work anymore. The economics have changed."
The number of schools at risk underscores the persistence of structural problems in the archdiocesan school system, defying repeated efforts to stem three decades of closings.
"We've never seen numbers like this, so we don't know what to expect," said Greg Richmond, director of Chicago's New Schools office, who said he heard 30 to 40 Catholic schools were at risk of closing. "We don't know where they are, so it's hard for us to know how it will affect our neighborhoods."
Of the archdiocese's 235 grammar schools, more than 160 currently have fewer than 250 students, Dolan said. During the last three years, enrollment in Catholic elementary schools has dropped by 11 percent.
Several options will be considered, she said, in addition to regional consolidations. Some schools may be given time to solve the problems. Others may close permanently or be rented as charter schools.
