Closures pain pupils, parents and teachers -- Photo slideshow Watch video
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- At St. Margaret Mary School in Midland Beach, books are boxed up in classroom corners, and students and teachers are saying teary goodbyes. It might not be an uncommon sight for a school in June -- but there's a big difference from years past.
Come September, the books will still be in boxes. The students will not return to their desks at St. Margaret Mary School, or at any of the seven schools on Staten Island slated to let out for the last time this month, dismissing more than 700 students for good.
"I don't think it will hit anybody until September," Principal Rita Vallebuona said.
Four Catholic elementary schools and one high school, St. Peter's Girls, will close for good, with a combined 619 students, according to October enrollment figures. Trinity Lutheran School in Stapleton, with 126 students this year, also will close, as will the small El-Bethel Christian Academy in Westerleigh, with 34 students.
Overall, 779 students will see their schools close. On top of that, the building that houses another 210 students at St. Peter's Elementary School will be shuttered, with staff and students relocating to the former St. Paul School in New Brighton.
In addition to St. Margaret Mary, the New York Archdiocese is closing St. Sylvester School in Concord, St. Mary School in Rosebank and St. Roch School in Port Richmond. They are among 27 schools that lost their archdiocesan funding, as announced in January.
At St. Margaret Mary, where enrollment had dwindled enough to blend grades together, students wore shirts bidding "aloha" to their school this week.
"We tried to celebrate what St. Margaret Mary's was," Ms. Vallebuona said.
Marilyn Sims has been teaching there for 37 years; tears welled up as she discussed the closure.
"It's hard," she said. "I started teaching here and I've been here ever since. I've grown to love this place."
It terrifies her not to know where, or if, she will be working come September, Ms. Sims said. For the most part, teachers have been "in the dark" about their future, she said.
Some students are taking the closure hard. One first-grade student cried whenever it was mentioned, teacher Susan Sansone said.
"He said if he won the Super Bowl, he would pay to keep the school open," she said.
Ally Dwyer, a seventh-grader, has gone to the school since pre-school. Now she will be the only member of her family not to graduate from St. Margaret Mary.
"It's really sad. I wish it wasn't closing, because I only had one more year left," she said.
Fran Davies, associate superintendent for communications at the Archdiocese, said teachers would be assisted in accordance with their union contracts. Those who don't have a job at another Catholic school in September will be offered transition packages, she said.
It was too soon to say what would happen to the buildings left behind by the disappearing schools, Davies said. Some may be leased or used for other parish programs, she said. At St. Margaret Mary, the attached Olympia Activity Center, completed in 2005, will remain open.
On the Island, 63 percent of students from closing schools are already registered at alternate Catholic schools for September, Ms. Davies said.
Joel Sanabria, 10, had only been going to St. Sylvester School a few months when the closing announcement came. He had transferred over from the relocating St. Peter's.
"It's really sad," Joel said. "The people were nice. I made a lot of new friends."
When his family started looking around for a new school, they tried nearby Trinity Lutheran, said his grandfather, Jose Sanabria. But that's closing, too.
So next year, Joel will attend St. John's Lutheran School, in Castleton Corners. But not every parent picking up their children outside St. Sylvester had decided where to go.
All of Alma Arocho's children went to St. Sylvester, but her 9-year-old, Alyssa, will have to find a new place for the fifth grade.
"My daughter is very disappointed," she said. "She wanted to graduate from here, like her brothers."
Ms. Arocho said she was afraid if she sent her daughter to another Catholic school, it, too, might close. But Alyssa, as a fifth-grader, would only spend a year at public school.
"I really don't know what to do. I'm upset," Ms. Arocho said. "It's all about money. And the kids suffer."
Alyssa said she was sad about being separated from her best friend, Cayla Cruz, 10.
"When I first heard about it, I started to cry," she said.
Principal Evelyn Lacagnino said school officials have tried to make the transition comfortable for students. Even though many won't graduate from St. Sylvester, they will still have a history there, Ms. Lacagnino said.
"They're still alumni, as far as we're concerned," she said. "We'll always have a place for them."
At St. Roch School, the year went out with a bang, when a group of about 300 teachers, alumni and church leaders celebrated the school's 51 years at a party earlier this month.
Outside St. Mary St. Mary School in Rosebank this week, several parents expressed sadness about the school's demise -- after more than 100 years of education.
"It's a sin," said Ken Ryan, picking up his granddaughter, Genesis Alvarez, 5.
Olivia Amosun said both she and her daughter, Majesty, 6, would miss the school.
"I like the way it makes her feel," Amosun said. "She's been doing great."
Catholic schools are not the only ones to close under pressure of low enrollment or climbing expenses.
El-Bethel, operated by the neighboring Assembly of God church, is closing after 25 years.
"I'm looking over the final yearbook of the school," school board chairman Fred Tvedt said. "It's a sad thing."
Tvedt said he was thankful to the principal and staff for their hard work, and for taking a pay cut this school year.
"They have indeed sacrificed a great deal monetarily and every other way to teach at the school for the last year," he said.