that is very nice of the other schools, but what does it tell you about the poor administration of tc over the past few years. i am a tc alumni and have yet to be contacted about any of this ...at any time to this day.

that is very nice of the other schools, but what does it tell you about the poor administration of tc over the past few years. i am a tc alumni and have yet to be contacted about any of this ...at any time to this day.

that is very nice of the other schools, but what does it tell you about the poor administration of tc over the past few years. i am a tc alumni and have yet to be contacted about any of this ...at any time to this day.

Dorthy TC's financial situation isn't a guarded secret. My kids go to a different school in the Archdioscese and we've read enough in various papers to know TC was in trouble well over a year ago. You and many others seem to be under this notion that the school should have personally notified you. All the money in the world won't help if enrollment is declining as it has been at TC. The only thing the administrators did wrong was wait too long to admit the obvious.

The best thing that could happen to public schools is to have all the kids who go to private schools attend public schools.

@M Blake
You state an opinion as if it was a fact. My opinion is that the public schools and the kids that are being educated there would be better served if the state did not put funds into non-public schools. I also believe that public schools would do better if more parents and kids were committed to them, which would happen if more kids moved from non-public to public schools. And finally I think that the state is better served when all it's citizens receive a better education as opposed to just those who can afford to send their kids to non-public schools.

I acknowledge these are opinions and not hard facts.

I graduated from TC and now have a child in parochial school. I completely disagree with "Who am I now BC". As a parent, I should have 100% control over where my child receives an education as well as over the type of education my child receives. Many parochial schools are using curriculum that is more advanced than the surrounding public schools. This is due in part to the excessive amount of time the public schools spend preparing for and taking standardized tests. Instead, the children in parochial schools are receiving well rounded, standards-based educations that include fine arts and foreign language, as well as instructional technology. Perhaps it is the public schools that should take a lesson from the parochial and non-public schools. Perhaps we would be better served as a nation that lags behind many others in science and math, that the current system of public education is antiquated. We need to begin to think of alternatives not as a threat to the status-quo, but a challenge to continually improve.

I am a graduate of a Catholic High School and a parish elementary school. I strongly disagree with the comment made by a previous blogger who suggested 'The best thing that could happen to public schools is to have all the kids who go to private schools attend public schools." I thank the powers that be everyday that I did not go to a public school in Baltimore City. When I attended school, you were more likely to be beat up or worse than get an education in Baltimore City public schools. I was fortunate that my father worked every hour he could to give me the opportunity to have a better education and a better life. If it were not for Catholic school, I would not have had the doors opened to me as an 18 year old going into the workforce. My freshman year of high school if I had went to the local public high school, I would have witnessed according to friends and newspaper accounts teachers being beat up, numerous assualts, and a rape on school property. It seems to me that Catholic schools are the last haven in the city at least for a safe learning environment where students can thrive academically. My heart goes out to the TC students who must now decide where to finish their high school careers.

I just wanted to say that I whole-heartedly agree with @A Parent. Well put !

TC Alum:

I love when people misinterpret what others say. I will try not to make that mistake here with what you say and would appreciate you doing the same. Specifically:

1) I never said nor have I thought that anyone should tell you where to send your kids. What I said was that the energy and money and the kids (better prepared) and families who currently attend private schools would make the public schools better if they attended the public schools. I said nothing about telling you where to send your kids.

2) One of the major differences between public and private is that if a kid isn't doing well either behaviorally or academically at a private school the school can send them packing. I am NOT saying that this is what happens to every kid, but it is always an option. Not so with public schools. We have no where to "send them" and must educate all kids who show up.
3) As for curricula, I cannot speak to what TC uses since I don't know, but I do know about many public schools who use cutting edge methods which would blow away any place else I have seen. I have had a chance to visit (as an educator) the Park School and noticed that their middle school used the same math curriculum that is used in many public schools and is (as a matter of fact) the "controversial" curriculum being considered for one of the counties - TERC (see elsewhere in the BLOG for more on that). I didn't notice anything rocket science about the teaching, but I did notice that kids were better prepared for things and were more self motivated, a fact I attributed to the families and to the fact that those families were paying over 10,000 per year for education - a strong motivator and a large divider.

I stand by what I say - if we could get all of those interested and involved parents and kids to flood the public schools that would go a long way to improving things in the public schools.

For all the parents and alumni who are crying the blues, when was the last time you did something for TC? As the parent of a recent graduate, this is what I witnessed over 4 years: fewer than 5 parents at any given sporting event; less than 100 in attendance at bingo; PTA meetings with 5 people in attendance - the officers. I loved that school and poured my heart and soul into it as if it were my own alma mater. It saddens me that the school has closed, but where have all the complainers been in the past? I saw how the administration tried to reach out to graduates, plan alumi events, and and ask for gifts to the school. Nothing received substantial response. Now, all we hear "would have, should have, could have". Where were you when we needed you? It's too little, too late.

@TC Parent - how would more parents attending a PTA meeting have solved the issues with the lack of support from the church and the budget issues ? Perhaps if the people running the school communicated that there were problems, those PTA meetings you were alone at would have been more crowded. I'm not sure that blaming the parents is the right thing to do in this case.

Also, is bingo done in conjunction with the school or just the church ? I'm not sure that organized gambling is something you should be doing at school... do they have a drinking and smoking night too ? Count me in !

BC - Not to split hairs, but your original post would have been less controversial had you included all that you did in your response. It is sometimes very difficult to tell from "zingy" one-liners the true intent of someone's thoughts.

To clarify, many non-pubs and parochial schools don't really expel kids at the drop of a hat, which can be a frustration for other parents. The principals are hard pressed to dismiss someone's tuition in hard times. Regarding funding, understand that the state and feds give non-publics very little money. There is some state textbook money that is applied to our book bills (that's right, we buy every book our children use, every year) and there is access to some federal Title I and Title II monies - but a small percentage based on enrollment counts. Non-pub parents, however, pay as much in taxes as anyone else to support state education system whose focus is on testing, not educating children. Because of this, however, non-public and parochial schools actually save the state money each year that can then be given back to the local public schools. If all of the non-public and parochial students were to flood the public schools, the state's education budget would not be able to support it.

It is not an easy decision for a public school educator to send a child to a parochial school, especially when personal budgets are at the breaking point. But I don't trust the public schools to provide the quality of education that my child - and everyone else's - deserves.

TC provided a great education and a wonderful opportunity to meet and socialize with a wide variety of people from every social class and background. It has been one of the only parochial high schools with such a diverse student population. I did support alumni events and requests for assistance. I did attend the bull roasts and read my alumni newsletter regularly. I am disappointed that I won't get to send my own child there and I hope that the archdiocese will look at the funding models and viability studies more closely to ensure that this does not happen to any other schools.

Laura wrote: "My freshman year of high school if I had went to the local public high school, I would have witnessed according to friends and newspaper accounts teachers being beat up, numerous assualts, and a rape on school property."

In the public schools, we teach students to say, "If I had gone," not "If I had went."

I think that if parochial schools is good in teaching then the towson Catholic High students have to stay in the school.If they don't like their teaching then they will go at other school.