K12 Catholic School Alliances, from the High School Perspective

I believe a day will come when many of our parish-based elementary schools will combine with our diocesan high schools into "K-12 schools", led by a single president, with a single business office and Board, and with principals at each
"campus." We did this in Montgomery, Al, in 2001, combining St. Bede elementary, Queen of Mercy elementary and Catholic High into "one school on three campuses " and renaming this new entity "Montgomery Catholic Preparatory School." We then built a middle school on the high school campus, and reconfigured the K-8 elementary schools into K-6's. The model has been highly successful, reversing a decade-long slow bleed in enrollment, creating PR, development, and financial efficiencies impossible for any one school "going it alone." From 2004-2008, enrollments grew by 35%. 

In the mean time, however, the most common model remains K-8 parochial schools funneling into a (typically) diocesan high school. I believe that even within this structure, there are "alliances" which can be created between schools that are of mutual benefit to each school within the alliance. Drawing lines of distinction between the schools too sharply or thinking too narrowly misses opportunities for mutual collaboration and benefit. Most of what this alliance entails depends on what the high school is willing to do. Here's some of what I've done and am thinking about doing in this regard (Some of this has gone on for years between high schools and elementary schools around the country.)

1) First, let us be very generous in sharing facilities with the K-8 schools and their families. This begins to create the important sense of "we" in the K12 community. In Nashville, the two Catholic high schools hosted all CYO soccer, football and basketball contests for the elementary school kids. That meant that once a week or so, parents on those teams visited our high school with their children. Is that taxing on the high school? You bet!--so much so that I reconfigured our assistant athletic director's hours to work Saturdays and be off Sundays and Mondays, so that he could be the liaison between the school and CYO. But development experts will tell you that the chance of families enrolling in your school down the line increase dramatically if they visit your school three times or more, so I saw it as a healthy long term investment in admissions. And in the interim, I'd argue we're doing the right thing by sharing our resources with the broader Catholic community--our schools don't belong to "us," after all, but to the Church.

2) Encourage a sense of "we" in the faculties of the younger grades. I tell elementary school teachers and staff to consider themselves as "adjunct faculty" of the high school, and to emphasize this point, I send them event passes for all home athletic contests and musical concerts,  and encourage them to come see their former students perform. More substantively, I tell them that I want their sons and daughters in our school, and emphasize if they need help to meet tuition costs, I will absolutely prioritize them in giving out limited financial aid monies. If we want to be a true "presence" to the younger grades, the best way is to make sure the teachers in those grades are parents in the high school!

3) I believe that we in high schools should also prioritize financial aid to assist families with children who are in both the high school and elementary schools at the same time. I think it wise to "package" this priority in some sort of marketable way, by telling parents, for example, that "If they have children in both the Catholic high school and elementary school simultaneously, we'll give the family half tuition scholarships if they qualify." That doesn't create an additional burden on the high school, because those families must qualify through an independent financial analysis, whether they have kids in other schools or not. And if they do, these are truly the families we want to help first! By setting things up this way, we acknowledge the sacrifice families are making to send their kids to our schools, and simultaneously, we assure the elementary school leadership that we're thinking of them and seeking to add value to their school. 

4) High school athletic programs are a powerful uniting force for the Catholic community, bridging over parochial divides. If possible, consider combining the middle school programs of each elementary school into "middle school" athletic programs of the high school, playing the same area K-12 private schools that the high schools play, only at a younger age . We did this in Montgomery to great effect--the "Knights" middle school program began in 2001 and actually paved the way for building a new middle school and reconfiguring the elementaries into K-6's in 2004. And here in Mobile, with an active CYO program, we're not advocating pulling the elementary schools out of CYO, which would hurt the Catholic league, but combining the Baldwin County Catholic elementary schools, some of which are too tiny to support their own teams, into a single CYO team whose name will be the "Cardinals" (our high school mascot) and which will play at the high school site. Doing so improves access for athletics to students in these smaller schools even while creating a unified "identity" that can only help the high school in its future admissions. Everyone wins!  

5) I haven't yet fully implemented this, but it's on my agenda to explore: I believe there are monies to be saved if the high school works in concert with elementary schools to negotiate bulk purchasing for things like paper,  internet access, or copy machine contracts. The more business we can bring vendors, the more powerful our alliance, and the more willing vendors will be to negotiate with us. Often the high school has a finance director that can negotiate with vendors in a way that secretaries of elementary schools simply don't have time or the expertise for, benefiting everyone.  

Aristotle once said: "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts." In a similar vein, Steven Covey urges us to "Think win-win" in his "Seven Habits of Successful People. I think we're wise to think this way about our K12 schools. 

Pastors and Principals--Three Practical Suggestions

Parish schools have two undisputed leaders: the principal (and in rare cases, a president) and the pastor. Canon law is clear that the pastor has ultimate charge of all ministries in his parish, including the parish school. Even so, the “face” of the pastoral ministry of the parish for young families is often the principal. When the two work together as partners, both school and parish can have a transformational effect on the life of families. When there is friction or misunderstanding between them, things fall apart. Here, then, are some practical ways in which pastors and principals can build partnerships to advance the important ministry they both share.

Establish a sacrosanct weekly meeting. In almost every case I’ve known where pastors and principals are at odds, they are not meeting regularly. This is a simple fix! There are too many overlapping areas not to talk on a routine basis, and when we don’t, we inevitably misunderstand the actions and motivations of the other. 

“Oh, we talk all the time,” one principal told me, “No need for another meeting.” I disagree, strongly, on a number of levels.  “Drive-by” meetings are almost always problem-driven, aimed at solving a particular issue of the present, and rarely involve any kind of strategic discussion about the future. Since they are quick, impromptu meetings, often the “issue” is resolved by one person informing the other what he or she has decided to do, rather than a kind of healthy give-and-take. Unwittingly then, both begin to ask themselves who has the “right” to make this or that decision, such that the context is one of authority rather than partnership. And in my observation, over time, these unscheduled meetings become less and less frequent, given the natural busyness in the life of both pastor and principal, leading inevitably to misunderstandings and resentment.

Honor symbols--Pastors and principals should look for ways to stand “side by side” both literally and figuratively in their parish ministries. For example, the principal should invite the pastor to every PTO meeting--at minimum to open the meeting with prayer, but beyond that, I’d suggest the principal ask the pastor to say a few words on the topic of the evening by way of introduction. The pastor should find a way to say “yes” to such invitations, recognizing it links him powerfully to his families. Parents love it when the pastor is present, as it affirms the “Catholic difference” they’re investing in. Short of unresolvable conflicts (but let’s be honest, most conflicts are avoidable or resolvable), I believe it’s really important for the pastor to be at big, school wide events. But the principal must invite him to have a meaningful role.

Show up for stuff--A pastor friend of mine once said, “The secret of my job is just showing up.” He went on to explain that if there were a CYO game being played in his gym on Saturday morning, he’d walk over and talk to families for 30 minutes or so, or say hello to a CCD class, or visit an RCIA class. I believe the pastor can have an enormous impact on the life of a school simply by “popping in” on schools and visiting classrooms,, shooting hoops with the older boys at recess, talking to a gaggle of middle school girls about the latest TV show. Our Catholic elementary students and teachers respond well to an active male presence in the school.

I think the same is true in reverse. We Catholic administrators often bemoan the fact our pastors are not as involved as we’d like, but we try and maintain as low profile as possible in parish life and too often miss events where our very presence would affirm the importance of the event. What pastoral initiatives and events are really important to the pastor? We ought to know, and find ways to show up for them.

A few final remarks: One of the great blessings of my life as one who has worked in Catholic education for thirty years is the fundamentally good, holy pastors and principals I’ve come to know and call “friends.” These are people who have committed their lives to God and to others; I would even call many “saintly.” It’s a sign of our brokenness that even among saintly people, misunderstandings and hard feelings develop. Instead of reading the tea leaves, trying to decipher the intentions and motivations of the other, or trying to ferret out who has the authority to make which set of decisions, we need to be very intentional about building human relationships with each other. The synergy and optimism that comes from a friendship between pastor and principal makes both ministries more powerful, leading families to heaven.

There is no higher calling.

Great Minds, Great Hearts, Great Things

I often look for ways to elevate the discussion of our schools with others, and in this respect, I continue to be edified by Pope Francis, who has a way of saying things both simply and powerfully. Not too long ago, he said this off the cuff to an audience of Albanian and Italian elementary and high school students:

Following that which St. Ignatius teaches us, the principle element of school is to learn to be magnanimous. Magnanimity: this virtue of the great and of the small, that makes us always look to the horizon. What does it mean to be magnanimous? It means to have a big heart, to have a great spirit; it means to have great ideals, the desire to do great things to respond to that which God asks of us, and exactly this doing of daily things well, all of the daily acts, obligations, encounters with people; doing everyday small things with a big heart open to God and to others. It is important, therefore, to tend to human formation aimed at magnanimity. School not only expands your intellectual dimension, but also the human dimension.  (Vatican Radio, June 7, 2013)

Great minds and great hearts to do great things for the Lord--what a powerful way to talk about our mission with others! 

"Magnanimity"  comes from two Latin words, "magna" meaning "great" and "anima" meaning mind or spirit. Thus "magnaminity" means literally "great-mindedness." St. Thomas Aquinas, in the Summa, defines it as a "stretching forth of the mind to do great things. " He contrasts it with "pusillanimity," from "pusil," meaning "small," such that a pusillanimous person is a small-minded one, without great aspirations or ideals. It makes sense, then, that in modern parlance, pusillanimity is a synonym for cowardice, since those without large vision or ideals are not moved to action and are inclined to "play it safe." 

Aquinas argues the reason people tend toward pusillanimity is that deep down, they don't believe they have the "qualifications" to be magnanimous. They believe that magnanimity is a virtue for the spiritually elite-- the saints, perhaps--but not for us, we who are ordinary.  It's as if we tell ourselves, "if we aim low, we won't be disappointed." 

And in fact, we live in a culture that consistently aims low for our youth: "We don't really believe you're capable of virtue or of chastity, so practice safe sex." "We don't really expect you to be committed to scholarship, so we'll inflate your grades." "We don't think you're capable of handling disappointment, so we'll be sure that you and everyone else gets a trophy." And the sad thing about this consistent messaging is that teenagers begin to believe these things about themselves. 

But that's not our vision in Catholic schools! We are children of God, temples of the Holy Spirit, infused with God's grace to do great things with our lives for others! We are all called to holiness! We are all called to become saints!

I believe teenagers are hungry, deep down, to be challenged. They are utterly bored and uninspired by an accommodating, "lowest common denominator" approach to life. Instead, they want their lives to matter; they want to be challenged by the gospel, to believe that such a life is possible, and they are powerfully attracted to people that seem to be living as if it were. 

Magnanimity, then, needs to be the consistent theme of our schools, calling our students to do great things. "I can do all things in Christ who strengthens me" (Phillipians 4:13) is the Scriptural message. And even in doing the lesser things, Mother Theresa remarks: "We can do small things with great love." May we consistently remind our students they are powerful, strong, and capable of doing great things for others.  

11 Tips for New Principals

This month I begin my 27th year as a Catholic school principal, president or headmaster, and I can truthfully say I hope to continue for another twenty or so more, God willing. As we ramp up for the year, my thoughts and prayers are for the many new principals who are no doubt nervous! Here's some of my best tips, learned through years of trial and error (and error, and error).

1) You don't have to make decisions right away, especially the tough ones.

Because we want to be "decisive," it's easy to fall into the trap of making instant decisions, on the spot. But the truth is, there are very few circumstances where we MUST make an instant decision, and we should take advantage of this fact to consult with others and pray. When I was a first year principal at a young age, I got very good at saying "I'll need to think this over and pray about it, and get back to you tomorrow." Then I'd walk across the hall and talk to the president of the school, who had been the previous principal,  to seek his advice and then think and pray about it that night.

For difficult decisions (non-renewal of contracts, expulsions, lengthy suspensions, etc), it's often good to tell the affected persons what we're considering, but that we need an extra day for prayer because we know it impacts them greatly. They usually appreciate this. More importantly, it gives us the ability to discuss the "hypothetical" with them without hardened positions, gives them a chance to advocate for themselves and feel like their perspective will be factored into our final decision, gives them time to absorb the bad news and get past the immediacy of emotions, allows us to end the meeting without being shouted at (!)--and most important of all, gives us a chance to truly seek out God's wisdom and guidance.

2) We don't have to be the trigger that fires every gun. 

I sometimes ask principals: “Who is responsible for opening up their school in the morning and who locks it down at night?” Too often, it's us!  It needn't be--more than likely, there's someone on our faculty who loves to get to school in the morning before anyone else. Ask him or her to open up--usually, he or she is quite willing to do so. Who is in charge of ringing the bell to change classes on alternate bell schedule  days? For my first three years as principal, our math department chair was consistently frustrated with me for being a few minutes late, distracted as I was by other duties. So in my fourth year, I asked him: "Would YOU be willing to ring the bells between classes?" He was delighted!  From that point forward, bells rang on time, I had one less thing to do, and one less teacher was grumpy with me! 

In fact, the more "routine" tasks we can delegate, the more freedom we'll have to give attention to people. Having an executive secretary is NOT a selfish thing if it allows us more time with students, faculty and parents! Our attention is the greatest gift we can give those we lead.  It elevates and affirms them, and they, in turn, are more open to our leadership.

3) It's OK to modify on the fly what we believe should be the consequence for serious discipline, if necessary to build consensus with parents. Ultimately, the purpose of discipline is to change behavior, and if the school and parents are at odds, whatever the school does is almost certain to be less effective.

I am not talking about retracting a position that we've already taken with the parents or child. Once we've "pronounced," it's usually important to stick to our guns. Rather, I am referring to our decision making process before hand. For resolution of serious disciplinary incidences, I usually go through a four or five step process:

• I first meet with the child privately and review what took place, with an attempt to get the child to admit what he or she did wrong. "Owning the problem" is the first step in all 12 step programs to change behavior, and rehab experts say it's the most important. Also, if the child admits it, there will be less problem with the parents accepting our final judgment, and we can affirm the child's honesty with their parents, despite whatever he or she did wrong. 
• Next,  I have the child call the parents and tell them what happened. I typically step out of my office and let the parent and child talk privately. Then I take the phone and ask the parents to meet with me the next day (this allows for a family discussion that night and also allows some of the emotions to dissipate). 
• Next, I meet with the parents, apart from the child, review the facts with them, and discuss options. It's in that interaction that I am trying to discern a consequence they can support, even though I am not asking them directly or seeking their "permission." Perhaps I was going to give the kid a 3-day suspension, but in talking with the parents, I sense they'll only support a 1-2 day suspension. I'll make a private decision to modify, on the spot, in order to speak as one voice with the parents to the child. I meet with parents separately from the child because in today's world, if they walk in together to face me, the parents' instinct is to be the child's lawyer, and I am trying to create the opposite effect--that the school and parent are a team of adults trying to help this child learn and grow through their mistake.
• If I believe I can establish a common ground which is commensurate with the seriousness of the issue, I will tell the parents then what I want to do. If I cannot, I tell the parents what I am "thinking about doing" (see #1 above). 
• Then I invite the child into the room to review the facts, ask the child if he or she has anything to add, and then pronounce the consequence (or for serious issues, possible consequences, see #1 above).

If I follow this process, most of the time I can achieve consensus with parents--and when we do so, that moment is almost always a turning point for good in that child's life.  Building such a consensus takes time, and some times, it doesn't work, as some parents are simply unwilling to accept their role as partners with us. On these sad occasions, we must stand firm, even though we know we'll be less effective in helping the child grow from his or her mistakes. 

4) Follow up a few weeks later.

When a parent brings us a concern and we address it, we should cue our appointment calendar in two weeks to check in with the child or the child's teachers and send the parents a follow-up email, asking them "how things are going?" Parents are deeply grateful we've remembered the meeting and are still thinking about their child. It both affirms the parents' concerns and assures them we're keeping an eye out.

5) "Catch kids (and adults!) being good."

So much of our instinct as principals is to correct wrong behavior. A wise principal once told me it's much more important to affirm GOOD behavior, both privately and (where appropriate) publicly. We respond so much more powerfully when people legitimately compliment us! And if we want to build an optimistic culture which affirms kids and tells them they're capable of greatness, it's important that we are the #1 cheerleader of the teachers and coaches who must communicate this optimism to our students.

6) Short, handwritten notes are powerful.

I have school stationary on my person where ever I go. When I have a few moments, I'll send a quick note of thanks to students, or parents, or donors, or send my condolences for a loss. As a standard practice, whenever the school learns of a death within a family (mother, father, aunt, grandparent, great-grandparent), I ask my secretary to place an envelop and sticky note with name and reminder of who died, so I can jot off a quick note of prayer and support for that family.  It takes me less than 3 minutes to write such notes, but they have real impact. 

7) Late Friday afternoons are good for difficult meetings.

The weekend is a good time for people to regroup after hearing bad news and get themselves in the right state of mind for Monday. Also, schools tend to clear out more quickly on Friday afternoons, making whatever emotions a person may be experiencing less public in nature. And for all the same reasons, Friday afternoon is also a good time to post athletic team "cuts" (especially cheerleader cuts!) .

8) "Re-baptize" existing school events for new, additional  purposes rather than create new events.

We're too busy, and adding events just makes everyone even busier, especially we who must plan and execute them! But Notre Dame, for example, uses timeouts during its football games to make special presentations on the thirty yard line to those deserving of the school's recognition, and everyone in the stadium claps for them. That's 85,000 saying "thanks" vs. the 300-400 who might come if ND sponsored a banquet. And the banquet would be far more expensive and require many more hours to prepare for and clean up after. 

Typically, we kill ourselves during National Catholic Schools Week with all sorts of special events (which is why we're so thankful when the week is over!); how many of these events can we tie into already existing things, like the weekly school mass (perhaps we invite grandparents to mass instead of a big breakfast, and have refreshments with their grandchildren thereafter) or the basketball game on Friday night ("alumni night," with a special sign-in table to get a big "alumni" badge, and a public welcoming during the game's introductions)?

We used to have "admissions breakfasts" for prospective families in our conference room, until we realized it was more powerful for new families to come to the school at lunch and experience eating in the school cafeteria between the school's two lunch periods. It takes no work to prepare the additional food, but gives prospective families a much more authentic "window" into the life and feel of the school.  Keeping with that theme, we then give parents the option of attending one of 4-5 actual classes in session rather than prepare simulated presentations. 

9) Frequent, 2-3 minute observations of classrooms are more powerful than 45-50 minute "evaluations."

I supervise by "walking around and listening in." I make a few mental notes to praise what I've observed about what was going on. Affirming the good is always more powerful than ferreting out the bad (see #6).  Good teachers, especially, want us to notice what they're doing--they're rightfully proud of their work! And those who tend to cut corners will be less likely to do so if their we could "pop in" at any moment. Students and parents like it, too, as it assures them we "know what is going on."

10) Usually, a group meeting to handle a common complaint or concern is a bad idea. 

When teams of parents want to meet with me about a mutual concern (a coach,  for example, or something that happened in a classroom, or a new policy in the school), I always express a willingness to meet, but not in a group setting--rather, one parent (or couple) at a time. When I meet individually, I can listen to his or concerns, and how this has affected his or her child directly, and avoid the "hearsay" criticism a parent may have heard, which is often repeated as "dogma" in group settings. In group meetings, emotions of one parent often feed the emotions of the other, leading to a negative chemistry which is not conducive to resolution. Yes, it's more time consuming to meet with 3-5 parents individually than all at once, but the time spent is worth it if I am truly interested in bringing some sort of catharsis to the situation.  

11) Pray often! 

Endemic to our culture today is a distrust of leadership, and from time to time, we'll be distrusted and/or unfairly criticized. To keep our ideas fresh, to be the kind of optimistic person our schools needs us to be, it's important to bring our life to the Lord. Among other things, we should keep a private running "list" of intentions for particular teachers and students as part of our prayer life. Reminding ourselves of their struggles and asking God to bless them helps shape us and predisposes us to be sensitive and creative in addressing their needs.

Principals, I believe, can have a profound effect on families and on the culture of the communities they serve. It's a noble profession! My prayers and gratitude to those of you who have "accepted the call!"

 Got a question? Thoughts? I'd love to hear from you. 

Catholic Schools: A Eulogy

When Flannery O'Connor was asked why her short stories contained so much violence, she answered "For the almost blind, you draw large and startling figures, and for the hard of hearing, you shout." The reflection which follows is a deliberatively provocative "shout" to those of us who have been blessed with prosperity, many of us as a result of being catapulted ahead by the formation we received in Catholic schools: 

"If I am being honest, my social class defines me more than my faith. Though I was raised in Catholic schools and have a certain nostalgic affection for them, my wife and I now have the means to send our son to a more elite private school, and just as we successively “trade up” our homes and neighborhoods, so too does our family’s affiliation with these elite schools mark our improved social standing.

Passing on the faith to our son remains a goal, but it's often a logistical headache to get him to CCD classes, with athletic schedules, academic commitments, travel and the like. We tried to go to Church together when he was young, but now he’s a teenager, and Mass and CCD classes are boring to him, so we haven’t pressed the issue.

But I can't complain. I am proud of the man he’s becoming. His grades are good, he has a firm handshake, looks you right in the eye when he speaks to you, and seems to be developing the social skills to get ahead. He has a great summer job as an intern with his classmate’s father, a relationship that will help him in his future. It’s all about the connections! His private school requires service work, so I think he's getting some of the "Catholic thing" there—he tutored some kids in Math from the public school on the other side of town, which was an eye opening experience for him. “Besides,” I told him when he expressed some anxiety about it, “it will look good on your resume.”

It is hard to imagine someone being this honest, but for many of us who are upper middle class Catholics, this narrative too accurately reflects our underlying values and priorities about raising children. For many of us, Catholic schools are "dead."

They did not die from antipathy: most of us who were raised in Catholic schools have generally positive memories and feelings for them. Catholic schools didn’t die because the sisters left or because tuition has become too expensive; many of us send our children to schools which are pricier. They've died because we’ve changed, because Catholic schools prioritize things we no longer value: the transmission of faith, a common sacramental life, or a consistent intellectual tradition. These have become “niceties” that we say we want for our children, but only if they’re able have the more important things: academic opportunity, first tier athletic facilities, or social status. Catholic schools have facilities which are too dated, their campuses too shabby, their P.R. efforts too limping by comparison. Absent the rare, expensive Catholic high school that can deliver on all these prerequisites AND transmit the faith, we opt for what we most value.

We tell ourselves as parents that we can “handle” the “religious part.” But most of us as parents have no idea about what the Church says about the purpose of government or its appropriate role in regulating the economy. We may have strong opinions about capital punishment or the war in Afghanistan, but very few of us can articulate why the Church is opposed to both, or the intimate connection between both issues in the social teaching tradition. We like the idea that our kids should develop a Catholic world view, but know deep down that’s virtually impossible by going to Mass once/week or by attending Sunday morning religious ed classes taught by well-meaning but untrained volunteers. We hope our kids will meet a dynamic priest or youth minister in our parish who will ignite our kids’ enthusiasm for the faith, but secretly believe such a person is more likely found in a different Christian faith than our own. We try and convince ourselves we can have the same scope of influence on our kids’ attitudes and moral values when they are older as when they were children, even though we know it’s natural for teens to spurn their parents for a time and seek other adults to emulate.

"But wait!" we protest. "Who’s to say the local Catholic school can deliver on all these things? I heard they have theology teachers who teach heresy! I heard it has a drug problem! I went to a game once and their player took a cheap shot at one of our players!  I hear their school masses are dull! I know a person whose child doesn’t practice the faith after she paid for all those years of Catholic schooling! If they’re teaching values, the values aren’t sticking!"

Most of us wouldn’t buy a car without doing research, but we’re willing to decide on the place our kids' attitudes and values will be profoundly shaped for the entirety of their young lives on the basis of these “he said, she said” rumors. How many of us have really done the research? How many of us have gone to the source and met with the principal of the school to express these concerns before deciding? Are the rumors true? What has the school done? How many of us have visited the Catholic school while in session to truly understand the culture of the place? How many have discussed the school with other parents who have committed their children there?

We haven’t done these things because the answers we would find don’t really matter in the end. If we’re honest, the rumors only serve to justify a decision we’ve already made. Better to leave them as unverified rumors than confront the fact we’re making decisions based on a set of values we’d rather not acknowledge.

R.I.P. Catholic schools!

New Habits for Financing Catholic Schools

Salaries, Raising Revenue, Cutting Costs--
For Presidents, Principals and Boards of Catholic Schools

My title is intended as a play on words. The sisters are by and large no longer with us, so we must find new "habits" for financing our schools, recognizing we can no longer rely on the heroic sacrifice of these magnificent women. Here, then, are some thoughts on how we might do that:

I. Salaries

1) Do away with salary scales. At my previous school I had them; at my current school I do not. Not having them gives me much more flexibility to go after teachers I need to get and keep the ones I need to keep. Our local Board gives me a “salary” total as a line item in our budget, and I have to stay within that. I believe Catholic schools have a misplaced sense of fairness that all our teachers must be paid the same, independent of degree or value to the school. The world doesn’t work that way. My roommate in college was a chemical engineer and I was a theology major. I had no doubt that he would make more money than I would when we both graduated (he did). The average kid graduating with a Physics degree can make $60,000 starting off, and the gap between what he makes and what our salary scales dictate widens over time. We have to recognize these realities when we hire. Salary scales guarantee we are under-paying some and over-paying others. If we are fortunate enough to get a maestro English teacher, we can give that person healthy raises over their tenure with us to keep him or her. But when we compete for teachers, if we are constrained by a salary scale for hard to get positions, we’re entering the battle with a self-inflicted wound.

If your diocese or board insists on salary scales, ask to design salary "bands" rather than exact salary charts, so that you retain some level of discretion over salaries based on the importance of that person to the school. 

Also, avoid a common and costly mistake that is true of too many salary scales: keeping the range from highest to lowest too tight. Our entry salaries, typically for first time teachers who are in their mid-twenties, are too similar to our 10, 15, 20 year veterans. Much better to widen the scale, with our entry salaries being very low, but then increase their salaries more generously, with, I'd argue, at least a twenty-five thousand dollar difference between starting and top-end. This has three positive effects: First, it saves us money overall,  because when the base salaries are relatively "high," the floor is raised for all employees, whereas if the bases are lower but the back end is higher, the higher salaries only apply to a limited portion of long-time, top end employees. But second, a wider distribution of salary scales, in my opinion, directs our limited resources the right way, to our longer term employees, upon whom we rely greatly and whom we need to stay with us, and who incidentally, have greater expenses. There's a big difference in household budgets between a 25 year old single person and a 35 year old mother of two! Finally, wide salary scales give our employees the satisfaction of improving their "standing" and salary more quickly,  giving them reason to stay with us longer. 

2) Consider signing bonuses or relocation stipends for newly hired faculty. This allows us to be competitive for new teachers while keeping first year salaries on the low side (see above).  Maybe I can only pay an incoming teacher $45,000 when a competitor can pay $50,000. But if I give that person $3,000 cash when they sign their contract, I’ve got a chance. Typically, teachers between jobs need cash right then, especially if they’re young teachers about to launch their careers. And because it’s a one-time bonus, I am not obligating our school for the future with the higher base salary. I’ve had success with this  in getting the persons we needed.


3) Consider joint-housing agreements. Likelier than not, there is empty rectory or convent space in your area. It sits there, empty, all year, even though the parish or religious order must pay to maintain it. Packaging a job offer with a low cost housing rental agreement could make your school a financially viable place to work, especially for a young, single person. It's a "win-win-win" for all those involved: the school pays nothing but offers a genuine "benefit", the parish/order gets some income whereas before they got none, and the young faculty member is able to save more each month from what is likely, alas, too puny a salary!

II. Raising Revenue:

1)  To raise revenue, raise prices. That may seem idiotically tautological, but it merits emphasis because we in Catholic schools often discount things that our families go right out and pay a higher price for elsewhere. To begin with, our tuition is typically too low. How can we compete with schools that are charging twice or three times what we are charging? We no longer benefit from being the lowest tuitions in town—people associate cost with quality. Would we feel BETTER about finding out our doctor charged half what the other doctors around town did? If we position ourselves in the market as the "K-Mart" of educational options, we're wasting whatever money we're spending on marketing to improve our public image. I think we need to adopt more of a college model, asking parents to pay for the true costs of educating their child, but also ramp up funding in financial aid. Over 80% of those in college now receive some form of financial aid.

Look at your second and third child discount rates. Many of us give half-tuition and two-thirds tuition off. Too much! If a large Catholic family struggles to pay tuitions, better to encourage them to apply for financial aid than to give an automatic tuition discount to the families who can afford to pay more.

Also, look at fee structures. Many Catholic schools treat their registration fees as down payments for next year’s tuition or deposits that will be refunded upon graduation. I would advocate that you lower the registration or deposit, but make it an annual fee that is added revenue. Most of our private school competitors do it this way.

Also consider raising prices for concession drinks, textbooks, gates to athletic games, cafeteria costs, the cost of school decals and spirit-wear. Our families don’t have to buy these things from us and if they do, they should have no expectation to pay less than market rates.

2) Institute a healthy financial aid policy—I anticipate most understand this already: If we have available seats, giving out more financial aid is not an expense but a revenue in the same way that discounting seats for airlines raises revenue. Better to get half fares for empty seats than no fare at all. If we have an enrollment problem, we have a real opportunity to make Catholic education more affordable to our families who believe they can’t afford us—make a negative into a positive!

The noble instinct in our schools is to keep costs down for the benefit of our poorest families. However, this in effect means we're subsidizing families who can afford to pay more and losing the revenue they'd willingly provide. It's better, I believe, to support our most vulnerable families through exceptional programs such as generous financial aid, rather than treat them as the base line for tuition setting. 

3) Encourage entrepreneurialism within your staff at school. Here’s a way to do it. Almost all schools zero out budgets for a new fiscal year. This virtually guarantees that those who are in charge of spending a line item in your budget will want to spend as much as you will allow them to, for fear of “losing” it to next year. It also means that unless you ride herd over them, they don’t care as much about generating revenue within their arena, either. Here’s what I’ve done with athletics, for example. I agree with our athletic director that he should raise X amount of revenue and have Y amount of expense for his budget that year. At the end of the year, if X minus Y is a positive number, I will place that amount in a designated fund—a savings account that he controls-- that doesn’t zero out. He loves that. But I also tell him that if X minus Y is a negative amount on any given year, I will withdraw money from that same account. The effect is this: Our A.D. is always looking for ways to add revenue and lower costs. Like many schools, doctors in our school donate their services on a particular Saturday morning to give free physicals to our athletes. Our A.D. decided to ask for a $20 donation for each physical, purely voluntary. Parents felt so good about how much that they were saving in money and time that they gladly gave up $20, and the athletic department made $6,000 in one morning for doing what they were already doing.

4) Never cancel debts from families for monies owed. Up to you as to whether you allow students to get report cards and even graduate, but always ask that family to pay the monies back when they can. Once a year, we send a letter to all those families with balances due on tuition who are no longer with us. And no, our return rate is not very high. But occasionally, just occasionally, a family responds and begins a payment plan. I don’t think that’s just good for the school—that’s good for our families, too, to provide them with an opportunity to make good on a debt they’ve freely undertaken.

5) Consider giving families the option of making an "annual fund" gift as an add-on to their monthly tuition payments. Typically, your monthly payers are not your biggest donors, so by providing this option, you're not undercutting your ability to ask for the larger gifts from others. You are, however, likely to get a larger annual amount from monthly payers if they can give $20, $50 or $100/month than if they make a single gift. And it should save significant staff and volunteer time soliciting through letters and phone-athons.

6) Advocate at the diocesan level that Catholic education is the responsibility of the whole Church, and not just those parishes with Catholic schools or those parishes with kids in our schools. I know that many dioceses link their subsidy amounts to per capita numbers of kids in a school. A parish without a school might be assessed 1,000 per child enrolled in another Catholic school, as an example. I am opposed to that method because it lets other parishes without a strong school population off the hook, and unwittingly discourages our pastors and finance boards from promoting our schools. Catholic education is an integral mission of the whole Church, a way of passing on our faith to our children. I believe dioceses ought to implement flax or progressive taxes on parishes across the board, independent of how many children attend schools in that parish, for the sake of supporting this broader mission.

III. Cutting Costs:

1) Consider alternative scheduling: We don’t often think of student scheduling as a way to cut costs, but there’s a room for saving money in how we do it. In my old high school, for example, we taught a traditional seven period day, and full time teachers taught in five of those periods (or 71% of the teaching day). We moved to a trimester schedule of five classes/day, of which teachers taught four periods (80% of the day). So each teacher, over the course of the year, went from teaching 5 credits (5 half credits in the first semester +5 in the second) to 6 credits (4 half credits in the fall +4 in the winter +4 in the spring). For every 20 full time faculty, that’s the equivalent of saving 3.5 teachers! But it was better than that: Since teachers only taught 4 periods each day, they averaged teaching  80-100 kids/day vs. 100-120 kids/day with five classes. Our kids went from juggling seven periods at a time to only five. We could insert remedial classes in the winter block if kids did poorly in English or Math in the Fall block. We could make some courses, like A.P. Calculus, a three trimester requirement.  Everyone was happier, and it was cheaper for the school—a rare combination.

2) Consider hiring part-time teachers. Two part time teachers are cheaper than a full time teacher because we don’t have to pay benefits. But I also believe if you find the right part-timers, they have more time for preparation for their one or two classes than someone teaching five classes and monitoring after school clubs or athletic teams. We are likely blessed to have among us very sharp, professional women who previously suspended full time work to raise their children, but may now be ready to work with us in a part time capacity. What is attractive about teaching with us is their work schedules mesh with their kid’s schedules: same days off, same hours and summer vacations.  Everybody wins.

3) Don’t rent or sell books, but instead, use an on-line vendor like Follet or MBS. Renting or selling books ourselves costs us in several ways: We must pay our bookstore manager, we must pay for significant trucking and mailing costs, we must find a place to store the books, we must secure books back and forth for students when they change schedules and most importantly, we must eat the costs of any unused inventory. We’ve started asking parents to purchase books using an on-line vendor, and all those costs and aggravations went away. With amazon.com now a way of life, parents are used to purchasing on line anyway.

4) Get out of the cafeteria business. It’s almost impossible for schools to make any money in the cafeteria, and more often than not, we lose money. And that doesn’t count the H.R. problems! There are two other possibilities: either contract with a professional cafeteria company, or if you’re too small, hire a part time mother to “run” a delivery service whereby the school imports food from local food vendors, pre-ordering each morning in homerooms. We do the former in my current school and did the latter in my old school. In both cases, we make (made) a little money. But I’d have been happy in my old school just to break even.

5) Re-think current hours for staff members of school. I know a school that lost 40 students but still wanted to retain its “specialty teachers” (art, music, etc.), yet there wasn’t enough money. At the same time, the school had a poorly regarded after school care program—not enough curriculum and too much day care. They decided to make the specialty teachers part of the after-school program and offered them a contract from 10-5:30. It worked for both teachers and school.

6) Re-think administrative structures. A principal and his or her secretary are no longer enough to run a school. The needs of students and their families are too great for one person, and the school can no longer rely on a cadre of mothers to serve as quasi-administrators for support and free labor. Rather than hire additional staff or administrators, consider creating "unit teams" of teachers.  An elementary school I know divided its K-8 school into three units: K-2, 3-5, 6-8, with a "lead teacher" of every unit in charge of the unit. The lead teachers' role is to coordinate and monitor curriculum within their unit, mentor new teachers, and be the "second line" of communication (after the child's teacher) for parents who need help. Each lead is given a significant stipend to recognize their administrative role and an additional free period, but the three stipends amount to much less than additional staffing. Plus, it's a way of giving our best teachers more money and responsibility.

IV. Concluding thoughts:

We in Catholic schools get uncomfortable talking so directly about money, preferring to focus on our mission. I think that is admirable! However, on average, our faculties are getting paid about 70% of what their public school counter-parts are getting paid. There’s an issue of justice there, and if we want to do better, we have to be very wise stewards of our school’s finances. We are not for profit institutions and no one is lining his or her pockets. Whatever margins exist go back into our school programs. "Without margin,” the saying goes, “there is no mission.”

May God give us the grace and wisdom to lead our schools well.

Ten Ways to Discuss "Why Catholic Schools?"

Simon Sinek, whose “Start with Why” youtube video has at this count over nineteen million views, says that the most successful companies talk powerfully about their “why” more so than their “how.” As an example, he says Apple is very successful, not by touting their excellent operating systems, but by trumpeting their commitment to individuality—that their products allow people to be fully themselves, unique, unconstrained by conventional limits to their productivity. That vision speaks powerfully to consumers, and it's pretty clear, given Apple's success, that it's worked! 

I am convinced that starting with the “why” is also the key to marketing and discussing our Catholic schools with others. Too often, however, we’re limited by our language in proclaiming this “why” to others, deadened by mission statements that discuss the “whole child” or that list a commitment to the minds, hearts, souls, bodies, etc. of our students. Yes, Catholic schools ARE committed to the whole child, but it’s such a cliché’ now that saying as much is uninspiring. So I’ve tried to find other ways of discussing our mission with others, pulling from a variety of sources, which may become reference points for us as school leaders as we talk about our school with others.  Here are some of my favorites, and in some cases, my brief reflections that follow:

1) “Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of – throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.” (C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity)

(We are architects and co-builders, working with God’s grace to build palaces--cathedrals, even!- in the life of our students, places where God can reside, transforming them!)

 2) “The glory of God is the human person, fully alive.” (St. Irenaeus)

(We want students to develop all facets of their personality, to become "Renaissance" young men and women, so they can become the best version of themselves, and in so doing, glorify God by fully embracing all that he has created them to be)

3) (Young people), it is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be ground down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal. (JPII, World Youth Day, Rome, 2000) , or

“Do not be afraid! Do not be satisfied with mediocrity. Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch!  (JPII)

4) Pope Benedict said something similar to youth recently: 

The world promises you comfort. But you were not made for comfort, you were made for greatness! 

5) Pope Francis, talking to young people about marriage, challenges them to become cultural “revolutionaries,” as follows:

"In a culture of relativism and the ephemeral, many preach the importance of enjoying the moment. I ask you, instead, to be revolutionaries, I ask you to swim against the tide; yes, I am asking you to rebel against this culture that sees everything as temporary and that ultimately believes you are incapable of responsibility, that believes you are incapable of true love."

(Our last three popes understand that young people live in a world of dreary accommodation, but instead, yearn deep down to live for something more than themselves. They want, ultimately,  to be challenged by the evangelical call of the gospel, and in our Catholic schools, young people hear this call, are inspired by it, and are supported to live it out! )

5) “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2)

(Catholic schools change lives. Our schools transform the minds and hearts of our students, so that they may seek what is holy—God himself.)

6) “There is an “optimism for excellence” here, borne out of our faith in what God’s grace is capable of achieving in the lives of our students if they’re immersed in a culture of high expectations, if they're supported by teachers and parents who care about them and pick them up when they stumble, if  they belong to a team, activity or club that they are passionate about with peers who share that passion, and if  they are invited to grow in their faith through prayer, worship and service to others. In such a culture, students truly flourish, becoming young men and women who are confident, happy and future oriented.“ (My presentation to new parents at orientation)

7) Peace Corps gets it. The armed services get it. Look at their recent recruiting slogans: "The toughest job you'll ever love." (Peace Corps), "Army Strong," "Be all that you can be!" (Army), "Not just a job, but an adventure, and "A global force for good" (Navy), "We're looking for a few good men," or "The few, the proud, the Marines." (Marines), "Aim high!" (Air Force). What do all of these have in common? They don't promise young people an easy life. In fact, they promise the opposite-- if they join up, they're going to be really tested. But through that challenge, by committing themselves to a cause that is larger than themselves, they will in fact "find themselves" and that their lives will be exciting!  This, too, is the counter-cultural call of the gospel: "For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world but forfeits his soul?" (Mark 8:36). Serving others is a "great way of life!" (U.S. Air Force). 

This, too, must be the inspirational and aspirational message of our schools.   

8) What is the mission of St. Rose of Lima Catholic school?  First grader #1 “To go to college.” First grader #2 “To go to heaven!”  (St. Rose of Lima Elementary video, Denver, CO)

9) Here’s a prayer I’ve found very helpful in sharing with teachers that helps remind them of their mission as Catholic educators:

This is what we are about.
We plant the seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.

This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an
opportunity for the Lord's grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master
builder and the worker.
We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs.
We are prophets of a future not our own.

(Bishop Ken Untener of Saginaw, often attributed, incorrectly, to Archbishop Oscar Romero)

10) We hold these truths to be self-evident—that all men are created equal, that they endowed by their Creator with unalienable rights, that among these are life liberty and the pursuit of happiness, that governments are instituted among men to protect these rights and derive these powers from the consent of the governed (U.S. Declaration of Independence)

All successful organizations begin with founding principles—with unshakeable, unalterable truths that give it vision and life.

In simplest terms—here are our founding principles of JPII:

• We believe students are children of God, and this fills us with optimism and hope about what they are capable of achieving and the kind of people they are capable of becoming.
• We believe that young people flourish when they are encouraged to explore the full breadth of possibilities for their lives: intellectually, spiritually, artistically, and athletically. In this belief, we take inspiration from St. John Paul II, who was a scholar, poet, linguist, outdoorsman, playwright, actor and writer. -We hope that this "renaissance vision" of the human person will inspire students to seek full lives, marked by curiosity, a love of learning, and a willingness to try new things.
• We believe that the goal of education is not inward but outward, aimed at building a more just world, redeemed by the gospel of Jesus Christ. The imperative of our faith is to love and to serve others--faith leads us beyond ourselves!  Though our test scores are excellent, the measure of our school’s success isn’t a test score or  an A.P. result, but whether our students leave us predisposed to make a positive difference in their families, churches and communities. 

The Declaration of Independence concludes with these stirring words: "And for the support of this Declaration, with firm reliance on Divine Providence for protection, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor. "  With firm reliance on Divine Providence, may we, too, accept the sacred honor to raise our children to grow into the young men and women that God has designed.   (a talk I gave at Back to School Night).

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Concluding thoughts:

Let us be bold! Our schools must embrace the evangelical challenge of the gospel and talk about this challenge openly with our students and prospective families. Our culture underestimates kids, inflates their grades, gives them trophies for everything. Deep down, sometimes beneath the veneer of apathy, they want more. They want to become "new creations," and to be "transformed, by the renewal of (their) minds."  They want to make a difference in other people's lives--like all of us, they want to live full lives that matter! If we speak openly and optimistically of this gospel challenge with them, if we build a culture of high expectations, prayer and support to live this challenge out, our schools can free young people of the gravitational forces that inhibit them from soaring to become the magnificent persons God created them to be! 

If we learn to talk this way about our schools, the "why" becomes a powerful force in drawing others to us. Language matters! Let's use it well!