Introducing Northeast Ohio Advocates for Catholic Schools

The Diocese of Cleveland’s Office of Catholic Education, together with the Catholic Conference of Ohio, seeks to strengthen and unite the networks of parents, grandparent, supporters and advocates who care deeply about Catholic education in grades preschool through 12. This blog and accompanying email updates will help inform and connect our support. 

This year especially, there is a great degree of political activity around school policies, and not just for public schools. All Catholic schools are affected by COVID-19 orders, transportation, administrative services, regulations, and school funding legislation in addition to the state scholarship programs for which every school can opt to be a provider. It is an important time to let our voices be heard.

Our aim is to build a network of informed and engaged supporters of Catholic schools by equipping them with information about the schools and related policies and providing assistance in spreading the good news of Catholic education. When you visit or sign up for our email list, you can expect to receive email updates including communication about Catholic schools and occasionally requests to let your voices be heard at the local, state and national level in issues that matter to you. You may also be invited to optional opportunities to learn about policy and advocacy related to Catholic schools.

To sign up, please provide contact information here, and please consider passing the invitation along to others who may be interested. By signing up, you will receive emails of content that will also be shared on this site. 

Popular posts from this blog

One Billion Dollars

Image
Haven’t you heard? Ohio is spending  a billion dollars  on private school choice! Numbers had been moving as the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce finalized the reconciliation of the fiscal year. They appear to have settled, showing that Ohio provided $962 million in payments to just over  150,000 state scholarship students  in all 5 programs for school year 2024, an average of just over $6,500 per FTE. Film buffs of a certain age may remember the   Austin Powers   movies from the 1990s, where super spy Powers and his nemesis Dr. Evil, both played by comedian Mike Myers, square off in the modern day after being frozen since the 1960s. In one scene Dr. Evil threatens to hold the world hostage for… “one MILLION dollars!” And that’s the gag – his evil henchmen have to point out that it “isn't exactly a lot of money these days.” Over a century ago, Mark Twain popularized the phrase about three kinds of lies: “lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Today i...
Read more

150,000+ Reasons to Celebrate: National School Choice Week

Image
  It is National School Choice Week, and we in Ohio have reason to celebrate – in fact, more than 150,000 reasons and counting, since that’s how many total students have applied for state scholarships since Ohio’s expansion of school choice to every household this year. All five scholarship programs are growing, to the benefit of Ohio taxpayers, families, and school systems. While it is cause for celebration, not everyone in Ohio is happy: a group known as “ Vouchers Hurt Ohio ” attacks this mechanism that permits state dollars to follow pupils. A spokesperson has been cherry picking facts to craft two partisan narratives that are troublingly misleading that I’ll address in this space and show why they are actually  cause for celebration . Program Growth The first misperception is that there are too many applicants, or the insinuation that the programs' wild popularity as people exercise choice will somehow result in being over budget. That claim was made by an advocate for th...
Read more

The Enemy

Image
School choice is not the enemy of public schools; rather, it is a component of “public education,” the ideal in the State Board of Education’s  vision   that all Ohioans “graduate from the PK-12 education system with the knowledge, skills and behaviors necessary” for continued education or the workforce. This position,   long held by the Catholic Church , is also the basis for Ohio’s scholarship programs that provide vouchers to students disadvantaged by low income, assignment to underperforming public schools, or diagnosed special needs. Every student who attends on a voucher -- all children of taxpaying Ohioans -- represents a savings to the state due to the efficiency of nonpublic schools. Some opponents have been grasping for reasons to protest, like a recent example in the  Cincinnati Enquirer , reprinted around the state, that employed some crude comparisons to conclude that state voucher programs were not performing better than public schools on state tests an...
Read more