Karim Camara
The article refers to the forthcoming closure of Catholic schools in the New York area. Many of the statements here may be read between lines by replacing the word "Catholic" with "Armenian." Many of the statements may also apply to Armenian school outside the Tri-State area and even outside the United States, in the far-flung Diaspora. What do we have to say? What do we have to do?
Last week’s announcement by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York that it may close another 27 schools should serve as a wake-up call for all who care about urban education across New York state. This is not just a “Catholic” issue.
Representing a state Assembly district in Brooklyn and serving as a Protestant minister, I know first-hand the value of Catholic schools in educating the poorest among us, without regard to religion. In the Archdiocese’s schools in New York City, 93 percent of students are nonwhite and 70 percent are from households below the federal poverty line. More than a third of students aren’t even Catholic.
For many families, neighborhood Catholic schools provide a safe haven, a nurturing academic environment and the surest path to college for their children.
That’s why we shouldn’t stand by and not try to come up with a solution. We must try to turn around the trend of closures.
Statewide, the number of Catholic schools dropped from 1,077 in 1981 to just 637 in 2011, a 41 percent drop over 30 years. Closures are affecting the New York Archdiocese today, but others a couple of years ago hit Brooklyn, Queens, Long Island and other areas of the state.
When Catholic schools close, more students flood our already-full public schools, increasing costs and overcrowding.
Many reasons can be cited for these closures, but the root cause is not a lack of parental demand or a lack of quality. Rather, it’s simply a shortage of people who can afford to pay full tuition — even though Catholic schools charge tuition substantially below the per-pupil levels we spend on local public schools.
With the city closing public schools for performance reasons, it doesn’t make sense to allow high-quality Catholic schools to go under. We need more good school options, of whatever type, not fewer.
Decades of research have testified to the success of Catholic schools, including high graduation rates and higher percentages of students passing high-school Regents exams compared to students in public schools.
Catholic schools also have served minority students well. Education historian Diane Ravitch has noted that African-American and Hispanic students in Catholic schools “were more likely to take advanced courses than their peers in public schools, more likely to go to college, and more likely to continue on to graduate school.”
Just consider some of the successful graduates of New York’s Catholic schools: US Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and a number of my legislative colleagues.
Catholic schools aren’t the answer for every child or the answer to every problem with education these days. But, in a state and city without enough good options for parents, Catholic schools are an important part of the overall array of public and private options that should be available.
My heart goes out to the families who’ll be affected by these closures. Every child deserves a quality education. That’s why we need to take legislative steps to make sure that families can afford to access the best schools for their children, including Catholic schools.
We should act holistically. Today, the issue is Catholic schools, but other religious- and private-school options are threatened, too. And, with years of budget cuts, public schools face their own challenges.
As policymakers, we must find a way to save Catholic schools as part of a broader effort to ensure access to high-quality educational options — public, private or religious — for all children of our state.
"The New York Post," December 4, 2012
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