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Published: March 22, 2009 07:59 am
EDITORIAL: Let’s save Niagara Catholic
Niagara County’s only Catholic high school is facing a daunting challenge — overcoming a $250,000 budget deficit by
June 30.
If the deficit is not erased by that date, the school will close.
Principal Robert M. DiFrancesco prefers to remain optimistic Niagara Catholic’s “family” will rise to the challenge. “Niagara Catholic is not closing, we’re doing everything we can to keep it viable,” he said Thursday.
The school is trying to reduce the deficit, including trimming staff and operating costs. The tuition is also being increased to $6,700 next year, up from $5,600.
This is not a time to run, rather a time to come together as a family to save Niagara Catholic High School,” DiFrancesco said. “We truly believe that if we can be successful in the next two months that we can make it in the long run.”
Niagara Catholic has had an illustrious history in Niagara Falls. The school came into existence in 1975 after the former Bishop Duffy and Madonna high schools merged together. Though the school has always been known for its academic excellence — 100 percent of its seniors graduated last year and 99 percent went on to college — it hasn’t been immune to the dwindling local economy and drastic drop in Catholic education enrollment over the past decade.
DiFrancesco said Niagara Catholic’s student population has gone from 220 to 160 since 2004. That, coupled with increasing operating costs and a swift reduction in aid from the Buffalo Catholic Diocese, has helped build the current $250,000 deficit. If nothing changes and the school stays open, the deficit is projected to reach $750,000 by June 2010.
A campaign has begun to solicit funds from alumni and community members and
efforts to recruit new students continues.
It would be a shame to see this institution close. Now is the time to act.
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