4 Nassau catholic schools to close

The St. Catherine of Sienna School in Franklin Square and Sacred Heart Elementary School in North Merrick are among four Catholic schools in Nassau County that will close next June due to dwindling enrollment and funding. Bishop William Murphy of the Diocese of Rockville Centre announced the news on Dec. 5, in a public letter that is posted on the diocese’s website.

The other Nassau County schools set to close are the St. John Baptist De LaSalle Regional School in Farmingdale and St. Ignatius Loyola School in Hicksville. Additionally, two Suffolk County schools will be closing: the Prince of Peace Regional School in Sayville and Our Lady of Perpetual Help School in Lindenhurst.

In addition to closings, the diocese is requesting that five schools collaborate during the 2012-13 school year in order to remain open long-term. Two of those schools are in Nassau County, the St. Dominic School in Oyster Bay and St. Edward the Confessor School in Syosset.

As of next September, the diocese will oversee 47 grammar schools, down from 53.

According to Murphy, the decision to close the schools was based on a recommendation by the diocese's Advisory Committee on Catholic Education, after an “extensive strategic review and careful deliberations of each school” of the Diocese of Rockville Centre. Murphy established the 19-member committee — which includes officials from the diocese and the New York State Education Department — in 2009, amid Catholic schools' declining enrollment.

In his letter, Murphy wrote that the recent decision was extremely difficult. “I want to assure the parents and children affected by this that they and their children are uppermost in my mind and in my heart,” he wrote. “My goal was to make decisions now that will allow us to say that there will be no more school closings beyond my time as your bishop … we, like many public school districts, must face the harsh reality that we no longer need as many school buildings as we may have had in the past.”