April 19, 2024
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2 Lockport Catholic grade schools will become regional school for Lockport and Homer Glen

By Denise M. Baran-Unland
Brianna Gehant, a 1st grade teacher at St. Dennis School, removes a cover of the Monarch Butterfly cage as the 1st and 2nd graders watch. Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2022, in Lockport.

Brianna Gehant, a 1st grade teacher at St. Dennis School, removes a cover of the Monarch Butterfly cage as the 1st and 2nd graders watch on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2022, in Lockport. St. Dennis School will merge with another Lockport Catholic School, St. Joseph, for the 2023-2024 school year. The new, two-campus school will be called Saints Dennis and Joseph Catholic Academy. (Gary Middendorf - gmiddendorf@shawmedia.com/Gary Middendorf)

St. Dennis Catholic School and St. Joseph Catholic School in Lockport will become one, two-campus school by next fall.

The 2023-24 academic year will be a transition year for the new Saints Dennis and Joseph Catholic Academy, the Diocese of Joliet said.

The academy will serve as a regional school, governed by a board of directors, for the Lockport and Homer Glen areas, the Diocese of Joliet said.

Pre-K and kindergarten students, and possibly first-graders depending on enrollment, will attend the St. Joseph campus, the Diocese of Joliet said. The remaining students will attend the St. Dennis campus. But no rebranding will take place during the 2023-2024 school year, the Diocese of Joliet said.

Over the next six months, a committee will “determine staffing needs; curriculum; athletics and extracurricular activities; an integration of school traditions; and a sound financial structure for the 2023-24 academic year,” the Diocese of Joliet said.

The committee will include “pastors, principals and school board presidents, along with the Catholic Schools Office and other diocesan representatives,” the Diocese of Joliet said.

However, no rebranding, such as new mascots and uniforms, will take place in the new academy, the Diocese of Joliet said. Parents, students, faculty and pastors, along with leadership from the Homer Glen parishes, will provide input to the academy’s new identity by the beginning of the 2024-25 academic year, the Diocese of Joliet said.

Homer Glen has two Catholic churches: of Our Mother of Good Counsel and St. Bernard. Neither church has a Catholic school.

The diocese had placed both St. Dennis and St. Joseph Catholic schools in “the urgent phase” because school enrollment was static or In decline, structure maintenance increased in cost and frequency, and meeting staffing needs was challenging “amid an unrelenting nationwide educator shortage,” the Diocese of Joliet said.

Bishop Ronald A. Hicks of the Diocese of Joliet decided to create one new school after his targeted restructuring committee unanimously recommended it, the Diocese of Joliet said.

“This unanimous, joint decision comes after a deliberate process involving parents of children attending both schools; pastors, principals, faculty and staff of both schools; and the respective school boards, parish councils and parish finance councils,” the Diocese of Joliet said.

For more information, visit dioceseofjoliet.org.