Why Catholic education?
There are loads of reasons why a family might choose to send their child to Catholic school—classroom sizes, athletic teams, academic excellence, community. But as a product of public education through high school, the most significant reason, to me, is mission.
I chose to go to a Catholic school for college. Sometime between move-in day and the first day of classes my freshman year at Mercyhurst University in Erie, Pennsylvania, we had a mandatory service day. I remember getting ready with my roommate—a dear high school friend of mine—and saying, “I guess it’s because of the Catholic thing?” Anyway, they divided up the freshman class, loaded us onto buses and sent us off to our assignments. Mine was to help with landscaping at an elder care facility.
Once classes began, those same groups met weekly in the classroom, to discuss college and common issues a student may encounter—but also to learn about the Sisters of Mercy, who founded the school (and Mercy Health!). We learned about their charism and their impact on the school, and we reviewed the individual core values they instituted for the types of students they hoped to produce. Each of the values were also emblazoned on banners, which hung on light posts throughout the campus—so that students would be reminded of them wherever they went.
That was well over a decade ago, so I have no idea if they’re still doing this with their freshmen—but I hope so. I was not very connected with my faith at this point in my life, but this made it clear that my education was to be grounded in Christian values like compassion, global responsibility and social mercy, which gave me so much more to identify with than a school mascot or singing a cheesy alma mater.
Here in the Diocese of Youngstown, we have 25 diocesan schools serving K-12 students across six counties. We also have Walsh University, in North Canton, which serves more than 2,000 undergraduate and graduate students from 42 states and 35 countries. Each of these schools has enjoyed the influence of religious brothers and sisters throughout their histories, each has vibrant religious education programs and campus ministry, and each is grounded in mission—a Catholic mission—behind which its students can unify and grow.
This is our back-to-school issue, and as such, we’ve launched a new series called Catholic Classrooms (page 21), which will feature a different one of our diocesan Catholic schools several times a year. We also have a story on the diocese’s newest ordained priest, Father Travis Seagraves (page 17), the Our Lady of Guadalupe Shrine in Windsor (page 24), a column on the meaning of hope (page 28)—and much more!
Happy reading! And to our students returning to school, “Good luck and God bless!”
Until next time,
Katie Wagner
