St. Peter of Alcantara, Port Catholic school, to close

Rose Weldon
St. Peter of Alcantara School in Port Washington will close at the end of this school year due to financial issues. (Photo courtesy of Google Maps)

St. Peter of Alcantara School, Port Washington’s only Catholic school for almost a century, will close its doors at the end of this school year, according to a statement from its parish.

Monsignor Robert Clerkin, the pastor of St. Peter of Alcantara Roman Catholic Church, disclosed the news in a letter to parishioners published on Friday.

“I am writing you today to share some sad news,” Clerkin wrote. “This is the most difficult letter I have had to write in my forty years of priesthood and in my first year as pastor here.”

Clerkin wrote that the school, which extends  from pre-kindergarten to eighth grade, had seen enrollment in the first to eighth grades decline 52 percent in the past five years, with a total of 176 students currently enrolled in the entire school.

He added that the coronavirus pandemic had “exacerbated the financial challenges faced by our parish and school.”

“The decline in offertory collections due to COVID-19 as well as lower anticipated revenues from tuition and fundraising, has made it clear that the school can not be sustainable in the 2020-21 school year and beyond,” Clerkin wrote. “I have decided, following much analysis and discussions with stakeholders at both the diocesan and parish levels, that I must announce the closing of Saint Peter of Alcantara School at the end of the current school year.”

The monsignor thanked the school’s community for efforts to assist students during the coronavirus pandemic.

“I realize this is a great loss for our parish and our school families, as well as the administrators, teachers, and staff of Saint Peter of Alcantara School,” Clerkin wrote. “I appreciate this is particularly difficult news given the tremendous work each and every one of our dedicated administrators, teachers, and staff exhibited during the COVID-19 pandemic. They were heroic in providing our students with a structured sense of normalcy during this most difficult time.”

Clerkin also directed parents to a website set up for students of Catholic schools being closed.

“Please know that Saint Peter’s students will be warmly welcomed into any of the excellent Catholic Elementary Schools on Long Island in the Diocese of Rockville Centre,” Clerkin wrote. “In the coming weeks, school officials and representatives of the Department of Education will assist our families with the process of selecting and transferring to a new school.”

St. Peter of Alcantara School is one of three schools in the Diocese of Rockville Centre whose closure was announced Friday, with the other two being Holy Family Regional School in Commack and Our Lady of Wisdom Regional School in Port Jefferson.

School officials and representatives of the Department of Education will assist parents and students in the transferring process, according to Sean P. Dolan, director of communications for the Diocese of Rockville Centre.

“We are deeply saddened by the closings of these three elementary schools,” Dolan said. “COVID-19 has had a significant financial impact on all of the parishes and schools within the Diocese, resulting in the difficult decision to close these three Catholic elementary schools in order to eliminate the unsustainable financial stress on their parishes … Unfortunately, the enrollment decline combined with the impact of COVID-19 on both parish offertory collections and tuition collections, and fundraising efforts, has made it clear that it is not feasible to maintain these schools financially.”

 

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