New Catholic school opens
Posted on Saturday, August 25, 2007
Springdale elementary is church's first new school in eight years
SPRINGDALE - There is a new Catholic elementary school in Northwest Arkansas, and institution supporters hope it will grow and prosper.
St. Raphael's Parish in Springdale expanded its 3-and 4-year-old preschool this year to include primary grades of K-3.
The school decided to start small in the first year by only going through third grade, but Principal Karen LaMendola said she expects later grades to be added in future years. The parish is the largest one in the Little Rock Diocese in terms of members.
"It's just a process of growing," she said.
"There's great potential there," said Vernell Bowen, superintendent of Catholic schools for the Little Rock Diocese.
The school had 82 students enrolled in the first week. This included 29 students in the primary grades and 53 in the early childhood program, LaMendola said.
The preschool has been in operation since 2004 and has reached the maximum enrollment its facility can handle.
An indicator that the elementary school is still very small is the mixed classes set-up. The school has two primary homeroom teachers.
One teaches kindergarten and the other teaches grades 1-3 in the same classroom, LaMendola said.
The school follows the "In Spirit and Truth"curriculum used by Catholic schools in the state.
"It's a ministry to the kids, too," LaMendola said.
Springdale is between Fayetteville and Rogers, which also have parochial schools, she noted. LaMendola said the school doesn't see itself competing with the other two schools, which include the 335-student St. Joseph Catholic School in Fayetteville.
"(St. Joseph's ) so far south, and St. Vincent is in Rogers. We have our own community here," she said.
St. Joseph Principal Ann Finch agrees, saying she sees the new school as filling a need in the Springdale community and giving people from that area another choice.
"I think it's wonderful that they're serving the Springdale community with Catholic education," Finch said. "It's an excellent way to get a classical education."
About 20 percent of the St. Raphael School's students are non-Catholics, she said. The others attend St. Raphael Church or St. Joseph's of Tontitown.
Besides providing a Catholic education to Springdale-area children, LaMendola sees the school as a necessity for the Diocese of Little Rock's long-term goal to open a Catholic high school in Northwest Arkansas.
"In going back to the feasibility study that we did on that (high school idea ), one of the things that came back was there needed to be more feeder schools," Bowen said.
The Diocese estimated it would need at least three elementary schools in the area to serve as feeder schools for a high school, LaMendola said.
As the school expands, LaMendola said it will probably go at least through the fifth grade. St. Joseph's goes through seventh grade, in part because the Fayetteville School District's junior high schools start with eighth grade.
LaMendola said the school will probably make a similar decision based on Springdale's grade format.
Finch said she would expect St. Joseph to add eighth grade rather than downsize to sixth grade if the Fayetteville School District follows through with plans to restructure the high school as a freshman to senior school in the near future. Fayetteville High School currently serves grades 10-12 and the district's junior highs have eighth- and ninth-grade students.
Construction is going on now to build a new gymnasium and cafeteria for the St. Raphael school. The cafeteria is currently housed in a large classroom, and students are asked to bring their own lunch this year because it does not have a working kitchen, LaMendola said.
Construction is expected to provide more space so the school could expand its grade level offerings.
St. Raphael's School is the first new Catholic school to open in Arkansas in eight years, Bowen said.
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