City Catholic School Crisis

Enrollment at New York City Catholic schools continues to decline. The Archdiocese of New York, which operates schools in The Bronx, Staten Island, Manhattan and northern suburbs dropped to 88,273 students. Diocese of Brooklyn elementary schools in Brooklyn and Queens dropped to 36,000 students. High school figures for them were not made available. Over 1,300 Catholic schools have closed nationwide since 1990. The main reason appears to be the higher cost of a religious education as compared to education in the public school system. Charter schools have also become a reasonable alternative for many Catholic families. Unless things change, Catholic schools won't have a prayer.

IMPORTANT NOTE: This blog is a quick comment on an older New York City news headline. Unforeseen NYCo website development delays prevented it’s publication before now. For readership continuity, 100’s of older headlines are to be posted in chronological order until this blog is current. Though some of the stories may no longer be as relevant as they once were, they remain interesting news items worthy of this site’s mention and viewer comments.

[This is a copyrighted editorial, originally published on http://www.NEWYORKCITYonline.com/NYC-Online/blog.php. We invite you to post your comments and reply to others! This piece may be duplicated or printed with permission.]

Charter Schools Should Change The Rules

New York City has 24,000 students enrolled in 78 charter schools. That’s only 3% of the total school enrollment; though 8 times more pupils than when Mayor Bloomberg took office in 2002. Bloomberg believes in the charter school concept. He cites their success as a reason public schools have gotten better. Give parents the option to place their kids in better schools and they will. Competition is a great thing. However, 3% of anything isn’t much. Certainly 3% after six years isn’t a significant number when charters have proven to be the better option of educating our children. We should increase the pace at which charter schools can be established and chartered. Additionally, the Board of Education should immediately adopt successful guidelines and approaches from the charters and incorporate them in public schools now. Why should millions of kids in the coming years receive a lesser education because they’re not fortunate enough to be in a better school?