WESTFIELD – It’s been a little more than three weeks since the announcement that Bishop Mitchell Rozanski of the Diocese of Springfield would be giving St. Mary’s Parish High School a one year non-renewable educational assistance grant of $300,000, on top of its normal allocation, to keep the St. Mary’s High School open for the 2018-2019 academic year.
Some of the Bishop’s stipulations about the future of the high school, aside from the grant, are that it must have a minimum of 20 freshman this coming fall for the 2018-2019 school year, then a minimum of 30 for each following year.
One parent who is involved in saving the school and knowledgeable about enrollment, but who could not speak on the record, said there are currently 17 freshmen signed up and the parent felt very confident that fall freshmen enrollment would exceed 20.
In the announcement, Fr. Frank Lawlor, Pastor of St. Mary’s Parish, stated that he would be looking at building a reconstituted Parish School Board. That school board is scheduled to meet tonight at 7pm.
Two members of the nine member school board are the principals of the elementary and high schools and the remaining seats are filled by members of the community.
While the official list of members of the reconstituted school board was not released, we do know that two previous members, one with decades of service to the parish school board and another who had been on for over a year were informed that their services were no longer needed. Two other board members resigned prior to the announcement of the school closing in February, one claiming frustration, and another member stepped away due to work commitments.
The crowd gathers on Saturday April 7, 2018 in the gymnasium of St. Mary’s High School for the annual auction. (WNG file photo)
Aside from the principals, it appears only two of the original seven community members will be returning.
In the parish’s ongoing fundraising efforts, on Saturday April 7th St. Mary’s held their annual auction fundraiser and leading up to the event Dawn Erickson, co-chair, was hoping to raise $50,000 since last year they had exceeded the $30,000 goal.
Erickson was elated to report that this year’s auction was an overwhelming success bringing in more than $75,000.
The next major fundraiser for the parish is their annual golf tournament scheduled for 12 noon Saturday June 9 at Tekoa Country Club in Westfield. For more information call Kathie Labrie at 413-335-4676 or e-mail [email protected].
