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Thursday, July 24, 2008

New Catholic School To Open

By Olivier Uyttebrouck
Journal Staff Writer
      East Mountains parents weary of driving their kids to Catholic schools in Albuquerque will have an option this fall.
    Holy Child School will feature small classes and an emphasis on classic books and religious education, said Nancy Fitzpatrick, the school's principal. Classes in grades 1-8 will start Sept. 2. Initial enrollment with be limited to 45 students.
    Readings will include "tried and true works of literature" by authors such as Mark Twain, C.S. Lewis and Robert Louis Stevenson, Fitzpatrick said.
    Latin and Greek will be part of the mix for students in grades 6-8, she said. Spanish will be taught in grades 1-5. The teaching of Classical languages is unusual, even for Catholic schools, she said.
    "It's part of the learning of the great books, the great works of literature," Fitzpatrick said of Latin and Greek instruction. "We had to get approval from the archdiocese to do it."
    The parish decided to open the school at the urging of parents, said Connie Rogers, director of religious education at Holy Child Parish.
    "Many of them take their children into (Albuquerque) to Catholic schools," she said.
    The parish hopes eventually to offer a high school, Rogers said. "There's not a plan but there is a dream" to open a high school, she said.
    Rogers said Holy Child plans to limit class sizes to 15 students. Classes will be held in a two-story education building on the parish grounds at 19 Camino del Santo Niño in Tijeras.
    The school is now searching for teachers, she said.
    Application packets and other information are available at the schools Web site at www.holychildcatholicschool.org.
   

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