This week we celebrate National Catholic Schools Week as a parish with a school. The faith and sacrifice of our parish has provided Catholic faith based education to students in the Redford community for 65 years. This is a blessing that we do not take for granted. Catholic Education is needed to help provide a beacon of Christ’s light in a world that is getting to be more confusing and challenging for our children every single day.

The theme of Catholic Schools Week 2017 is “Catholic Schools: Communities of Faith, Knowledge and Service.”

As we celebrate Catholic Schools Week I would like to share some Catholic School facts that I gathered from a variety of online sites.

Research on Catholic schools shows:

· Overall academic achievement is higher (Coleman, Hoffer, & Kilgore, 1982; Sander, 1996)

· The student/teacher ratio in Catholic schools is 14:1.(NCEA 2015)

· 99% of students who attend Catholic high school graduate. Of those, 88% attend 4-year colleges.

With attendance in any Catholic school for any period of time, students are:

· 4x’s more likely to be attending church at the age of 45

· 3x’s more likely to be confirmed

· 2x’s more likely to be married in Church (research noted by Sr. M. Paul McCaughey, O.P., Back to School Kick-Off, 2009) 

Catholic school graduates are:

· more likely to vote (Dee, 2005)

· more likely to earn higher wages (Neal, 1997)

· more civically engaged, more committed to service as adults  (Campbell, 2001; Wolf, Greene,  Kleitz,& Thalhammer, 2001)

· Currently, 6 of the 9 Supreme Court Justices went to Catholic school. (Boston.com)

Affordability:

· Catholic schools provide over 20.5 billion dollars a year in savings for the nation. (NCEA)

· St. Valentine School tuition cost is BELOW the actual cost per pupil

· The mean cost per pupil at Catholic schools is $5,436; the national per pupil average is $10,792). (NCEA; National Center for Education Statistics) St. Valentine School is more than $1,500 below the national average for in parish tuition.

· Catholic families can apply for tuition assistance from the Archdiocese for tuition assistance ($800 for K-12 and $500 for 9-12)

· St. Valentine School also provides tuition assistance to families with financial need

Cardinal Dolan of New York and former President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) said in his blog: “There is no more tried-and-true way of passing on our Catholic faith to our kids than by sacrificing to put them in a Catholic school. Data proves they persevere in the faith at higher rates, pray better, are more faithful to Sunday Mass, live gospel values, are more generous to their parish, even have happier marriages, volunteer more, and transmit the faith to their own children, than those not in a Catholic school.”

May God Bless St. Valentine and all Catholic Schools. Please keep St. Valentine Catholic School in your daily prayers.

Mrs. Rachel Damuth
Principal

Dear St. Valentine Parishioners,

St. Valentine Parish School is proudly entering its 64th year of service to families seeking faith filled educational excellence in the tradition of the Catholic Faith. St. Valentine Catholic School is now the only Catholic School in Redford. Our mission as a Catholic School will continue to be that we are a school who will welcome all of God’s children, a school that will ensure the success of every student in a challenging academic environment guided by Christian Values. St. Valentine families and dedicated staff will continue to work together to create a strong school community based on love, faith, justice, respect for all and high academic standards. While our mission has remained constant throughout the years and will not change, our mission statement has been updated to contain the same values as listed above, but to be a bit more “user friendly”. We want to be sure that everyone, parishioners, community members, school families, teachers, and even our youngest students, understand why St. Valentine Catholic School is here. Our new mission statement moving forward will be:

The mission of St. Valentine Catholic School is to provide a Catholic education based on:

Values rooted in Catholic tradition
Academic Excellence
Love and Respect for All
Strong Community in Christ

As a parishioner and a parent of two parish school children, I would like to thank the people of the parish for their continued support of St. Valentine Parish School.

The first day of school is quickly approaching and preparations for the new school year have been ongoing throughout the summer. The halls and classrooms have been freshly scrubbed, teachers are planning and preparing. We are excited to welcome many new families to our school this year, and look forward to seeing all families at our welcome back ice cream social. We had a successful Kindergarten round up with 21 students in our Kindergarten this year!

We are still accepting enrollment for new students even as the new year begins. We have openings in 3 year old preschool (Tuesday and Thursday), 4 year old afternoon preschool (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday) and we also have openings in grades 1-8.Share the good news about our school to anyone who may be interested.

Our first faculty meetings of the new school year began this past week with a retreat at Father Solanus Casey Center in Detroit. Please keep us in your prayers as we prepare and plan for another year dedicated to spreading the gospel message through educational excellence. Classes begin for our students September 1, 2015.

We are ever thankful for the support the St. Valentine parishioners give to continuing Catholic education at St. Valentine.

Many Blessings,
Mrs. Rachel Damuth
Principal