The school will open after Holy Trinity School closes at the end of the academic year.
GREENFIELD – Parents who want to continue their children’s Catholic education after Holy Trinity School closes at the end of the academic year now have an option other than sending their children to a Catholic school outside of Franklin County.
New England Classical Academy, an independent, coeducational day school in the Catholic tradition located in Claremont, N.H., plans to open an satellite school in the Turners Falls section of Montague in September.
“This model is feasible. It’s what we’re looking for, a classical education with a Catholic curriculum,” said Deborah A. Delabruere, of Bernardston, an organizer of the effort.
The program will offer education to children in grades kindergarten through six. An online high school program is under consideration.
Delabruere hopes to keep tuition to $2,000 or less per student.
“It’s essential that Catholic education be available to Franklin County residents,” said Edward M. Cottrill, of Greenfield, another organizer.
Officials of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield announced earlier this year the decision to close Holy Trinity School – which currently enrolls about 50 children in pre-kindergarten through grade six – due to declining enrollment and financial difficulties. Founded in 1929, Holy Trinity was a parish school until 2002 when the diocese assumed its responsibility.
It is currently the only Catholic school in Franklin County.
“The steady decline in enrollment led to the diocesan decision to close Holy Trinity,” said Mark E. Dupont, communications director for the diocese. “It was a difficult one for Bishop (of Springfield Timothy A. McDonnell) to make, understanding this was the last Catholic school in Franklin County.”
According to its mission, New England Classical Academy is rooted in the Catholic faith and committed to a traditional classical curriculum centered on the study of Latin, Greek and mathematics through which students “join with the greatest thinkers of human history in trying to answer the questions that help us to understand who we are and what that means about how we should act.”
Through readings and discussion, students experience “an intellectual and spiritual awakening that ennobles their hearts and minds,” the mission states. “They leave the academy with courage and hope, carrying with them the seeds of wisdom, knowledge, eloquence and virtue, ready to live meaningful lives of integrity, always aware of the sublime end for which they were created.”
Cottrill said the New England Classical Academy satellite plan was the best possible option for Catholic education in Franklin County because the school “already has a curriculum, they know what they’re doing, and they are going to bring it down here.”
Dupont said any group that wants to establish a “Catholic” school would need to first receive permission from the bishop. “Among his concerns would be the ability to operate this school in fidelity with all Catholic teaching,” he added.
According to Delabruere, two sites in Turners Falls are under consideration for the satellite school. One is the catechism center at Our Lady of Czestochowa Church, and the other she declined to identify.
An open meeting has been scheduled with the headmaster of New England Classical Academy on April 11 at 7 p.m. at Holy Trinity School.