Leader of Brilliant Black Catholic School in St. Louis Reveals the Secret to Its Historic Success

The Root via Yahoo ^ | September 7, 2022 | Angela Johnson

[grundle]

Armstead attributes the school’s perfect graduation and college acceptance rates to its mission, which includes faith, academic excellence and leadership. “Our goal is to help our students become the best version of themselves. They know early on that there will be a college application process. They know that the grades they make as freshmen will end up on their transcripts. So we set our standards high and stress them to each student,” she said.

Although many of the students don’t identify as Catholic, Armstead says the faith component of Cardinal Ritter’s mission is never an issue. “We’re a faith-based school, and most our students come from families who pray. They may not all be Catholic, but they know the power of prayer and have a relationship with God.”

[nicollo]

I hope so, but college matriculation is a far cry from college success.

Urban schools, including Catholic and charter schools, only track collect acceptance, not graduation. There’s a reason for it.

[Gay State Conservative]

A very hopeful story. It's great to hear of inner city kids who work hard and obey the rules with the hope of a productive,secure and comfortable future.

[BobL]

Why do I think they teach reading via Phonics and don’t use calculators in math class...

[livius]

I would say these kids are going to make it, because they’re not just being passed on through, but actually have to study and succeed in this school before they even think about college.

Public schools...not so much. The kids get passed on no matter what, they get helped into college - and they are totally unprepared and drop out.

That’s not going to happen with these kids.

[ChessExpert]

“Urban schools, including Catholic and charter schools, only track collect acceptance, not graduation. There’s a reason for it.”

It’s more work.

It would be interesting to compare this school to the urban schools these students would otherwise attend.

[TexasKamaAina]

What I get from this article is that segregation isn’t all bad.

[Bayard]

Our goal is to help our students become the best version of themselves. They know early on that there will be a college application process. They know that the grades they make as freshmen will end up on their transcripts. So we set our standards high and stress them to each student,” she said.

Every Catholic School says this.

[Pez149]

“Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.”

Words to live by...

[DennisR]

So this story is all bad???? What you say might be true, but you don’t stand a chance in college if you do not satisfy the basics. Be happy for these kids…they certainly look happy, don’t they?

[kearnyirish2]

“They may not all be Catholic, but they know the power of prayer and have a relationship with God.”

Most Catholics stopped funding schools like this a long time ago; they were just being sought by non-Catholics looking to escape bad public schools, and operated at a loss.

[kearnyirish2]

They tend to do better because the worst/most disruptive students are weeded out, and rather than offering full free rides many Catholic schools now require some payment from parents (so they’re invested in it as well).

[nicollo]

It would be interesting to compare this school to the urban schools these students would otherwise attend.

The kids in the Catholic school are there because somebody in their lives actually cares about them. Here are a couple differences that immediately come to mind between that school and the local public schools :

* Dropout rate:
- public high school: 40+%
- Catholic high school: 10-20%

* College admission (of graduates, so doesn't include the dropouts):
- public high school: 50-70%
- Catholic high school: 95+%

* Academic accommodations for prison time during school year:
- public high school: 10-20+%
- Catholic high school: <2% (if any)

* Teachers assaulted by a student:
- public high school: 20-40% ?
- Catholic high school: 0%

Numbers are just my best guess, but they're consistent w/ my experience as a Catholic school teacher and from teachers I know who teach/taught at public and public charter high schools.

Nevertheless, our urban public school mess is a cultural and not academic problem. There are plenty of families living in those areas of cultural rot that are not part of it -- and those are the ones who send their kids to the Catholic schools. For the rest, the best an urban Catholic school can do is to remove a kid, for part of the day, from that environment.

[HamiltonJay]

I don’t doubt their success...

Lowered expectations destroys kids for life.. as long as this school is expecting high things from their kids, they will be just fine.

Will they all reach the moon? Of course not, but they won’t wind up in the gutter.

[ChessExpert]

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