The days of Catholics automatically sending their children to Catholic schools have disappeared. Catholic leaders can no longer depend on baptismal records to adequately predict attendance at Catholic schools. Additionally, Catholic schools have scrambled to shift from a workforce composed of religious sisters to one dominated by the laity. Not only has this created challenges for Catholic schools to balance affordable tuition rates with needing to provide their employees with a just salary, competitive health care, and retirement benefits, it has also forced leaders to intentionally focus on enhancing the school’s Catholicity and its ongoing ability to accomplish its mission.
Thankfully, in response to these trends, various roles within Catholic schools have evolved. Instead of focusing on development as raising money for the school, Catholic schools must now focus on advancement to include annual funds, capital projects, planned giving, alumni relations, communications, special events, and prospect research. Similarly, instead of considering admissions as merely approving or denying admission to students interested in the school, Catholic schools need enrollment management approaches that encompasses recruitment, marketing, financial aid, demographic research, admission, and retention.
These evolutions acknowledge the increase in complexity in these efforts. They also transform the posture of the school from one of passive receptivity to one of active mission pursuit:
And so, now as in the past, the Catholic school must be able to speak for itself effectively and convincingly. It is not merely a question of adaptation, but of missionary thrust, the fundamental duty to evangelize, to go towards men and women wherever they are, so that they may receive the gift of salvation. (Congregation for Catholic Education, 1997, #3)
Instead of a hierarchical model, these changes to advancement and enrollment management encourage a spirit of collaboration. By thinking innovatively about who to involve in aspects of this work like constructing and analyzing data, more members of the school community - data gurus, number crunchers, and/or people interested in behind the scenes work - can have a greater hand in advancing and accomplishing the school’s mission. Indeed, “(c)ommunion and mission are profoundly connected with each other…communion gives rise to mission and mission is accomplished in communion” (St. John Paul II, 1988, #32).
 |
| "Pope John Paul II during the General Audience (790100)" by Belpaese.nl is marked with CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. |
These stances also imply a belief that excellence happens on purpose. In order to adequately create a budget, systems must be established to ensure financial responsibility. In addition to faithfully following a budgeting calendar, schools must be realistic about increasing costs associated with health care, the net tuition revenue actually collected, and concerning enrollment trends such as the matriculation of a large class. All of these situations require strong administrative oversight as well as honesty and humility. A strong budgeting process will help to anticipate upcoming dips in revenue and potentially indicate the need for restructuring.
Responding to these situations also necessitates innovation. Catholic school leaders should consider moving from step-in-lane pay scales to band range approaches to reward teachers for performance in addition to their years of service. Furthermore, Catholic school leaders should explore ways to transparently and simply communicate an employee’s total compensation package to include salary, benefits, and other amenities such as tuition remission, helping to pay for advanced degrees, or other school-based perks. Leaders should do something similar for tuition information, clearly outlining the true cost of educating a student. These purposeful practices not only ensure excellence, they also uphold the dignity of the school’s families, students, teachers and staff members.
As we faithfully forge forward in the ministry of Catholic education, may we continue to "(put) the person at the centre of education, in a framework of relationships that make up a living community, which is interdependent and bound to a common destiny" (Congregation for Catholic Education, 2017, #8).
While this work requires that we evolve, collaborate, and innovate, it also requires that we hold fast to Christ's model of discipleship through relationship one individual encounter, moment, and person at a time.
References:
Congregation for Catholic Education. (1997, December 28). The Catholic School on the Threshold of the Third Millennium. https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/ccatheduc/documents/rc_con_ccatheduc_doc_27041998_school2000_en.html
Congregation for Catholic Education. (2017, April 16). Educating to Fraternal Humanism - Building a "civilization of love" 50 years after Populorum Progressio. https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/ccatheduc/documents/rc_con_ccatheduc_doc_20170416_educare-umanesimo-solidale_en.html
Pope John Paul II. (1988, December 30). Christifideles Laici.
